


Ignorance is Bliss

by dragonwings90



Category: The Glass Scientists (Webcomic)
Genre: But he believes he does, Henry probably doesn't deserve this, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-16
Updated: 2019-10-22
Packaged: 2020-03-06 03:46:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 22,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18842980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonwings90/pseuds/dragonwings90
Summary: Edward's become a frequent visitor at the society as of late. Henry's become reclusive and unresponsive. Robert's become very, very concerned.





	1. Chapter 1

A shot glass hit the glossy counter with a clank, luring the bartender’s attention to the source of the unnecessarily loud noise.

“‘Nother one?” The blonde prompted in a wobbly yet assertive tone. The bartender, clearly annoyed at this last patron who haunted his pub, eyed him up and down. Edward rolled his eyes in an exaggerated manner and slowly pushed his glass across the table in response.

“I’m well aware of what you want, sir,” the bartender stated flatly, turning his back to the man to polish his glasses, “but we close early on Saturdays.”

“What?!” Edward exclaimed. “I’ve never heard’f a pub that does that ‘n my ‘ntire life!”

“Well, that’s the way it is here. Nobody oughtta to be shitfaced or hungover in Church, bud, ‘specially not in December... though it may be a bit late to prevent that, in your case.”

“Whaddya mean by that,” Edward slurred slowly, narrowing his eyes.

“I mean that you nearly tripped and fell over yourself three times just walking to the bathroom ten minutes ago,” the bartender reminded his clearly drunk customer. “Please leave. It’s nearly midnight.”

 _‘Edward, please, let’s just leave, the potion will run out soon anyway, I’m sure of it,’_ a timid voice urged quietly from the back of his mind.

“Shut it, Jekyll, I don’t need you telling me what to do in the few times I can do what I want,” Edward hissed sharply under his breath. Judging by the stark silence that followed in his head, Edward knew he had succeeded in shutting his counterpart right up. He’d been getting better at this skill for a while now. Smiling in satisfaction, Edward hadn’t noticed the sound of the pub door opening and then swinging shut behind him. He only turned to face the person approaching when the bartender notified them that the bar was now closed and they’d stopped walking and positioned themself just a few feet behind Edward.

“My apologies, good sir,” a rather posh voice replied. “I don’t require a beverage, I simply wish to chat with the man you have here, and then we will both leave in peace, I assure you. May we have a few minutes?”

Edward’s blood ran cold at the sight and sound of the man before him. Robert Lanyon stood as straight and tall as ever with his hands folded neatly behind his back. Of all people to meet now, it just had to be him. Edward felt Henry in the back of his head begin to silently panic at the sight.

Realizing that this may be a good way to get rid of Edward without having to drag him out of the pub himself, the bartender nodded. “I’ll give you five minutes,” he grumbled.

The tapping of the bartender’s footsteps slowly faded away as he exited the room, leaving the two alone, doomed to a conversation that Edward would kill to get out of. Any direct interaction with Robert he knew would have that effect on him, really. Robert then finally turned his attention to the disheveled drunk in front of him with a smile that Edward loathed. The kind of smile that cloaks true intentions.

“I take it you’re Mr. Hyde?” Robert asked as he held out his right hand. “It’s very nice to meet you. How has the night been treating y-”

“Cut the pleasantries, Lanyon, whaddya want?” Edward cut him off. Robert was clearly taken aback by this. “Yeah, thas right, I know who you are. I c’n smell a prick like you a mile away.”

Robert blinked and raised his eyebrows as if trying to get dust out of his eyes. “Okay, then,” Robert started hesitantly, “I guess I’ll get straight to the point. I don’t know how you know me, but I suppose that doesn’t really matter right now. I’ve been very concerned about our mutual friend Dr. Henry Jekyll’s behavior as of late. I haven’t seen or heard from him in many weeks, and from what the lodgers tell me, he’s been spending most of the daytime asleep or otherwise cooped up in his room. At night, apparently he’s flat-out missing, and no one knows where he is.”

“And whaddo I have to do with this?” Edward interrupted, gesturing to himself with an exaggerated motion. Edward could feel Henry getting antsy at the situation which manifested in an annoying churn of his stomach.

Robert paused. “...Well, the lodgers have also informed me that you’ve been showing up at the society more and more frequently. Rachel told me you’d probably be here or at another bar at this hour and suggested that I go talk to you because you are likely to know some information. I’ve been told that you’re the only person seen going in or out of Henry’s room at night, so-”

Immediately seeing a moment to strike, Edward interrupted him and slurred out with a mischievous smile, “What, are you jealous, Robbie?” Edward felt Henry, clear as day, furiously turn his attention to his tipsy counterpart, but say nothing.

Robert was clearly flustered at the assertion. “W-What? I… You-You appear to be drunk,” Robert stated firmly, attempting to regain an unswayed composure.

“And you appear to be a stuck up twat, what’s new?” Edward spat.

Clearly offended, Robert asked him angrily, “Do you even know where he is? Because I appear to be wasting my time right now.”

“Of course I know where he is, and you won’t find him tonight,” Edward informed him dismissively, turning back to his disappointingly empty glass.

 _‘What?! Edward, stop!’_ the voice in the back of his head shot up once again. Edward didn’t respond. _‘What are you doing?! Why are you still talking to him? Get out of there! The potion’s going to run out soon!’_ Henry interjected. As if on cue, the distant sound of Big Ben striking twelve sung through the air like a poltergeist and chilled Edward just as much as one. It would only be minutes now.

“Well then where is he?” Robert asked impatiently. “It’s important that he’s-”

“Well, that’s my cue! Sorry to leave so abruptly, I was having such a good time with our little chat, you know, but I have some business I need to attend to,” Edward half-lied in a mockingly cheery and posh tone while standing up and heading toward the door. Robert began asking him why and telling him to stop. Edward spotted a flicker of some sort of mental connection and sudden realization click in Robert’s eyes as the doors opened.

“Wait, where is he?! What did you-” Were the last words Edward heard out of the tall man before the doors to the bar swung shut. Breathing a sigh of mild relief that the confrontation was now over, he turned to stroll on home, only to hear the sounds of the doors shooting back open at a speed that could only mean that Robert wasn’t walking.

_‘Run!’_

Edward broke into a full-out sprint the moment he could process the thought and sped down the weaving roads before him. The distinct sounds of two sets of shoes loudly slapping against the cobblestone streets echoed against the empty lots and alleyways as Edward attempted to hurriedly drum up a route of escape.

_‘Are you sure you even know your way back home?! We’re so far away! Why didn’t you leave earlier?!’_

“Don’ worry, I got this,” Edward assured Henry with full confidence. This didn’t seem to calm his other half in the slightest. Edward’s shoes skidded as he turned sharply into an alleyway off a largely abandoned sector of London. This was obviously a shortcut. Edward had taken this route when he was in a hurry to get back to the society many times before, so it would work now.

By the time he got to the end of it, however, something was very clearly wrong. It wasn’t supposed to look like this. It wasn’t supposed to be a dead end. Edward knew the streets of London like the back of his hand. Why didn’t he know this was here? 

Thinking fast, Edward spotted a rusty fire escape ladder high on the wall to his right. Without a second thought, he jumped for it, but the moment his body weight put strain upon the old, frail metal, the joints snapped and down he fell with the ladder in hand. Edward just barely managed to let go of it and cover his head before he hit the ground with a seriously painful thud. After a moment of rubbing the throbbing spot at the back of his skull, Edward remembered just why he was running in the first place.

He slowly stood up and turned around. The dim light of the street lamp behind him illuminated the back of Robert as his silhouette charged at him. His chaser only stopped when he was about fifteen feet away from Edward and realized that he’d had him cornered.

“Where is he? Where is Henry?” Robert demanded as he watched the now hurt man before him frantically check his surroundings for openings to escape. There were none. “If you aren’t responsible for Henry’s disappearances, then you aren’t doing a bloody good job of showing it!”

“Oh, Christ, I hate you,” Edward hissed at Robert.

“I’ve had suspicions of your relationship with Henry for quite some time now, but it seems now that I have a legitimate reason for it. What have you done! Where is Henry!” Robert demanded more than asked.

Edward’s stomach boiled more and more with anger at this man. He’d been a thorn in Edward’s side every time Henry interacted with him from day one. He’d always ruin Edward’s plans to go out at night whenever he was near, and now, he’d be the nail in the coffin of ever going out again. Henry was frozen solid at the scene.

“You pretend to know what’s happening, Lanyon,” Edward growled, wiping the blood now dripping from his nose due to the fall, “but I assure you that you are wrong. I’ll give you one last chance to leave me now, or you’ll…”

“I’ll what!” Robert challenged.

Edward actually paused at this.

He considered for a moment. He was so angry at Robert, and for what? What could Robert possibly say or do that wouldn’t benefit Edward’s future attempts at convincing Henry to hand over the wheel for a night? In an instant, Edward found himself coming to the conclusion that It didn’t matter anymore. So what if Robert found out? It wouldn’t be Edward’s problem for long anyway, and Henry would be the one to suffer for it regardless. At this realization, Edward began to drain of anger and fill with some unidentifiable happiness.

Sensing the potion’s effects coming to an end, Edward chuckled dryly. “Oh, Lanyon. You simply don’t know the trouble your friend is in,” he teased with fake sympathy. “You want to know so badly what the truth is? You want to see what trouble your ‘friend’ is really in, well don’t let me stop you.” Robert stood there, genuinely not knowing what to say.

Edward shrugged. “So be it! Here we go!”

In an instant, Edward felt symptoms of the potion wearing off. His stomach felt like molten rock and his blood pumped faster than it ever should. His legs buckled and he collapsed onto his hands and knees. His body trembled and convulsed as green glowing ooze leaked from his eyes, nose, and mouth, pooling in the dirt and gravel below him. Out of the corner of his eye, Edward spotted Robert whipping out a small pistol that he leveled at the no doubt monstrous looking transformation. Edward smiled at this.

This was going to be great.

The moment that thought crossed his mind, Edward wretched clumps of bright cyan sludge onto the earth below and felt his time in the real world come to an abrupt, yet personally satisfying end.

Henry Jekyll then collapsed on the ground.

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

Robert stood, shaking like a leaf at what had happened. His mind raced with questions and theories of “what” and “why,” but none stuck around long enough to be considered. Numb with fear, Robert stepped toward the figure lying limp in a pool of the luminous substance. Gun outstretched, Robert pushed against the body with his shoe before recoiling and observing for a reaction. When none arrived, he slowly put the safety on for his pistol, putting it away, and reached down to turn the body over. His grip was firm, but cautious.

All air froze in Robert’s lungs at the sight of the body he’d pushed over. Without a flake of doubt in his mind, Henry Jekyll laid before him, blood dripping from his nose and the last of the mysterious glowing liquid draining from his orifices.

Faster than he thought possible, Robert dropped to his knees and put his ear to Henry’s chest. Not being able to tell the difference between his own racing heartbeat and the potential pulse of his friend’s body, he moved his hand to feel around Henry’s neck. Pressing his thumb under Henry’s jawline, Robert waited with bated breath.

Finally, he let the stale air in his lungs escape his throat. Henry was alive.

Stopping for a second, he considered just how little it mattered to him what had actually occurred before the moment he realized Henry was alive. He would figure that out later. For now, all that ran through his head was getting Henry home. That was all that mattered to him.

Mind buzzing with one part dread and five parts relief, Robert bent down and shoveled up the unconscious body of his dearest Henry using all his strength before heading quietly back to the society.


	2. 2

Upon waking, Henry felt dizzy. His sheets, cold with sweat, stuck to him, crumpled against his back. The nightmare that plagued him throughout the night still lingered in his mind and unsettled him deeply as he rose into consciousness. Something wasn’t right. Then he remembered that everything wasn’t right.

His eyes opened only to find himself staring at the ceiling of his very own bedroom. Nobody was in his room. Nobody was around. He could feel the pillow behind his head and the blankets over his body, the city birds trilling their distinct early morning song just outside. In the distance, he could hear a crowd of footsteps and voices sweep from the other side of the building. The lodgers were walking downstairs toward the dining hall for breakfast. It was morning.

Henry’s mind raced for an explanation. Was last night nothing but a dream? Henry doubted it. If that were a dream, he knew he would’ve woken up in terror right away and had it fresh in his mind. The nightmare he’d just woken up from was very different from what had no doubt occurred last night. Thankfully Edward was absent from his mind, and for now, Henry was alone.

This feeling didn’t last long, however, as he heard the sounds of drawers opening and closing where his kitchen resided just off his bedroom. The door was open, but from where Henry laid, the person inside wasn’t visible.

Henry shot up and felt blood instantly rush from his head, causing a painful throbbing that simply refused to go away. The movement in the kitchen came to a halt, and the sound of footsteps soon followed. Henry dreaded the sight of the man he knew would soon peek his head out from the door frame. He refused to look as the figure’s head came into view. Henry’s skin went cold and his stomach dropped. Robert’s voice was low.

“Henry… um…”

A long silence followed.

Henry knew Robert wasn’t good with expressing his thoughts and feelings, and after what happened last night, he was glad for that. A sudden churn of nausea swam its way around his stomach and Henry found himself numbly stepping out of bed. Toward his bathroom, walking turned to speed walking, speed walking turned to running, and before he knew it, Henry was retching violently over his toilet. Sweat beaded on his forehead, and the painful contractions of his diaphragm purged what smelled like stale alcohol from his stomach. He could scarcely catch a breath between the forceful heaves that wracked his weak body. It would be a while before his stomach settled to a hardly bearable, but stable level.

Feeling the presence of the tall man behind him, Henry breathed in small, quiet breaths. Robert was staring at him, but Henry wouldn’t look him in the eye if his life depended on it.

“We… were lucky nobody was awake last night. Nobody saw either of us.”

So Robert had brought him home. Henry didn’t know how to feel about that. He didn’t know how to feel about anything. His mind was so thickly fogged over with dread that no more thoughts could fill it.

He couldn’t take it anymore.

Within an instant, Henry burst past Robert and sped quickly out of his room. He could hear Robert’s voice from behind yelling something after him, but Henry didn’t want to know what it was.

After several turns down the hall, he leapt down the stairs and shot into the nearest bathroom, which was thankfully just behind the stairwell. He slammed the door shut and locked it, shaking as he gripped the handle. It was a moment before he let go and stumbled backward into the corner to his right, sliding down the wall, his mind buzzing with fear. Henry stared at nothing as his breaths came out rugged and shallow. His entire body felt cold.

Henry suddenly felt a presence before him and he slowly tilted his head up to look at it. Who but Edward would peer down at him, chin upward with a small, calm smile on his features.

“I told you to leave,” Henry whispered, holding back the tears and soft crying that eventually cracked their way out of his head and rippled pathetically toward the apparition. “Why didn’t you listen to me? Why... W-Why didn’t you leave?”

There was a moment of quiet from the man towering above him as he soaked up the sounds of Henry’s sorrowful whimpering with an ever-widening smile.

_‘Oh, Jekyll. You’d just love to pin this on me, wouldn’t you?’_ Edward’s voice then spoke. _‘You’d love to pin this on anyone but yourself, but we both know you can’t.’_ Henry buried his face into his knees and gripped his hair with both hands. He shook as Edward spoke clear as a bell in his head. It didn’t matter how much he tried covering his ears. That would do nothing to stop the voice. That would do nothing to stop the laughter. _‘I didn’t make this mess. We both know you’ve done this to yourself. Surely you’re not so surprised that this is all coming to an end. It was bound to happen sooner or later. How long did you really think you could keep this lie to yourself, hm? This facade? The moment I’ve been warning you about for years has finally come, Henry, and what better a person to find out than our dear Lanyon?’_ Henry was pulling his hair hard, hoping beyond hope to distract himself from the words in his head that he knew he couldn’t hide from. It didn’t work. Robert had done so much for him in the time he’d known him, and yet ever since the beginning of college where he’d met Robert, Henry was not much more than a burden on him. He would always take and take and take, and poor Robert never did anything to stop him. He always told Henry that he would be happy to help him with whatever he needed for however long he needed it, but there was no question that Robert’s life worsened with him introduced to it. Robert would do so much for him. He even nearly failed his classes one year because of Henry’s request for help with his work. After that, Henry did everything he could to keep Robert from giving him help, but Robert could often see through that. Even though Robert requested to join and fund the project of the society himself, Henry had no doubt in his mind that he had been the one to rope him into this mess. Henry would suffer for his sins, and Robert, an innocent bystander who didn’t deserve any of the trouble he found himself in, would suffer for Henry’s sins, too. _‘I know what you’re thinking now, Henry, and you’d be absolutely right.’_ Edward now hissed, _‘Lanyon hates you now. And how could he not? After all he’s done for you, this is what you’ve given him in return. All his time, money, and energy spent with a pathetic fraud. A disgusting liar that deserves nothing he has. I’d hate you too.’_

Henry’s cries now turned into sobs, loudly rippling through his body to the point where it rattled his small, curled form. “Stop it! Please!” he begged desperately. Remorseless laughter roared in return of his pleas. With no options left, Henry sat there, curled up in the corner, sobbing and pulling his hair hard, taking it, listening to the laughter that shot relentlessly from all directions.

A knock.

There was a knock at the door.

“Who’s in there?” a lodger’s voice sounded from behind the door. The voice was male, but Henry couldn’t pin down exactly who it was. “Are you okay?”

With all the energy he had left in his shaking frame, Henry forced a normal voice upon himself. “Yes? This is Dr. Jekyll, who’s there?”

“It’s Archer,” the voice stated, worriedly. “I thought I heard crying coming from over here. Are you okay?”

Not answering Archer’s question, Henry responded, “Crying? Well if someone’s crying, you’d better go find them! And report back to me when you do! I’ll take care of it from there. Thank you very much for letting me know, Archer!”

“Ah, okay!” Archer replied, a little embarrassed. “Sorry to disturb you, sir!”

The sound of footsteps walking away toward the dining hall slowly faded with distance. Henry was alone again. He was seriously thankful that the dining hall was far away from where he was. Archer must’ve been on a walk around the building and faintly heard him crying through the thick walls of the bathroom. It was a miracle that Archer bought his lie. He sniffed loudly and wiped his face. He heard a slow river of calmly chatting voices flowing down a distant hall. The lodgers were going back to their work. A world existed outside of his crumpled mind, and for now, Henry knew that he should, too. He would need to sneak back to his room to change, as many questions would rise if any of the lodgers were to see him in Edward’s clothing. As he carefully stood, the looming voice in his head had just one last thing to say.

_‘Go ahead, Henry. Enjoy your last days as a ‘good man’ with the life you have. I’ll be waiting for you when you’re done.’_

~~~~~~~~~~

Robert pushed past a group of lodgers and hurriedly apologized to them as he continued down the dining hall. He could’ve sworn Henry had turned into this room. He looked around and scanned as many faces as he possibly could. Nothing.

It had been days since Henry had woken up and fled his room in terror. Ever since then, he’d been avoiding Robert as much as he possibly could. The moment Robert would enter the same room as him, Henry would leave, and if Robert gave chase, he would quickly lose him. Henry knew the layout of the building more than Robert did. After all, Henry lived here, and Robert did not.

Robert had pieced together most of what was going on. Henry had worked on this project since the beginning of college. Robert never thought he’d be able to pull it off, but after the recent events, it was apparent that he’d been wrong. Henry must have succeeded in splitting the good and evil of his soul, and it was clear which half of his friend was which. Henry’s original goal with his project was to split off, and then end the evil parts of one’s soul so they could live a happier and more productive life afterward. It was clear that he had tried his experiments on himself, and completely lost control of his evil half. He couldn’t pinpoint exactly when this split occurred or what triggered it, but that didn’t matter now.

Robert sighed and sat down at the table behind him. He didn’t know what he could do. This was going nowhere. Luckily for Robert, he was determined, and wasn’t going to leave the society’s grounds until he caught Henry. What he would do when he succeeded in this was still foggy, even to him, but that wasn’t important in his mind. First things first, Robert would track down Henry. That was priority number one.

Henry’s room. That was where he would find him. Robert stood up and went to the location that would view the staircase leading up to Henry’s room from a distance, and waited.

He would wait there for hours until the sun set below the horizon. Not long before that, a storm began rolling in. Rain began tapping loudly against the windows, the sound of which tempted Robert to sleep, even though he resisted.

After waiting for so long, the silhouette of the man he’d been waiting for emerged quietly from the shadows. His figure was hunched well beyond his normal gentlemanly stature, and his head darted from side to side cautiously. By now, all the lodgers had gone to their rooms to sleep, despite the thunder that cracked outside the walls of the building. Henry had the luxury of having his room located far from any others, and that fact, Robert realized, would come in very handy for what he knew was about to happen.

As quietly as he could, Robert headed up the staircase behind him, hoping to cut off Henry as he entered his room. The society was dimly lit at this hour, and Robert was thankful for that, as it allowed him to hide with relative ease behind the protruding table next to Henry’s door.

Robert waited with bated breath as he heard Henry walk down the hall and unlock his door. The sound of the lock clicking and being pushed forward while Henry stepped inside signaled to Robert and he stepped out silently, walked over, and stuck his shoe between the door and the doorframe just before it closed.

Henry noticeably paused. His door had never gotten stuck like that before.

“...Henry?” Robert prompted softly, yet firmly. The moment the sound left his mouth, Henry jumped and made some pitiful noise of fright as he let go of the handle, stumbling back. Robert couldn’t help the sad expression that forced its way onto his features as he peered into the room. The whole place had been neglected. Clothes and various wretched smelling stains littered the floor, the bed was unkempt, a lot of stray candle wax drippings had not been cleaned up, and in the corner, Robert spotted a pile of empty wine bottles just large enough to make his skin crawl.

“Henry?” Robert repeated, this time more stern. “We need to talk.” Robert stepped past the doorway and turned to the door to lock it, as he wasn’t about to let Henry run from him this time. After doing so, Robert turned back to find Henry shaking where he stood.

Robert felt suppressed anxiousness bubble its way into his stomach before being pushed down once more. He studied Henry’s features carefully, picking up every detail he could.

Henry’s thin head pointed downward, each hand holding the other’s arm, just above the elbow. His eyes were trained on the floor to the right of his shoes, and if it were not for his furrowed brows, his face would’ve worn the exact expression of an owl about to be shot. Robert lowered his voice.

“Henry, you’ve been avoiding me,” Robert began, “...but we can’t pretend like what happened a few nights ago didn’t happen.” A light flashed outside, slowly followed by a rumbling thunder that made Henry shift in place. There was no response. “Henry, please look at me,” Robert begged as he approached the smaller man. Noticing his approach, Henry backed up further toward his bed. Robert stopped this advancement when he had Henry standing flush with the side of his bed with nowhere to go. “Henry, say something,” Robert pleaded.

“...I…” Henry whispered. Robert’s breath hitched at the timid and quiet first words Henry had spoken to him in weeks. “...I don’t...”

No words followed, and Henry fell back to silence. The guilt on Henry’s face was clear from the start, but now that he’d stepped closer, Robert found something else there. Something worse. He found fear. Not worry, but outright fear. Fear that had no business being there. Robert paused. There was no way, surely not, that he was what Henry was afraid of, right? After a moment of quiet worry and anxious thought, Robert tested his ridiculous concern and reached out his hand to the slightly shorter man before him.

Henry flinched twice. Once at the thunder that cracked viciously through the air, and once at Robert’s very own hand. Henry snapped his eyes shut and whimpered, his mouth quivering in a stiff shape with his quiet breathing at a pace that rivaled that of a handcuffed prisoner about to be thrown into the open ocean. Robert tried his best to control the shock and overwhelming sadness that suddenly flooded him at the realization of just what Henry was so scared of.

“Henry! Do you- Do you think I’m going to hurt you?” Robert felt like he was drowning in the very words he spoke. The thought was simply inconceivable.

Henry looked up at him with great caution as if he were worried this was some trick to lure him into a false sense of security before Robert took the opening to strike him.

“Henry…” Robert’s voice came out wispy and hardly audible against the pounding rain outside. Robert covered his mouth with his hand and tears slowly welled in his eyes. “Henry, no…” he whispered as he shook his head.

Henry now looked just as confused as he was cautious, but Robert paid no attention to this. His mind had turned into a blizzard of thought, and he could no longer control himself. The anxiety that he’d pushed down earlier game spurting back up, and Robert found himself no longer able to stop it.

With no thoughts left to think, Robert did the only thing left that he felt he could, and swiftly stepped forward and wrapped his arms tightly around his best friend. At this, Henry let out just the most pitiful cry Robert had ever heard.

Henry froze. He was shaking and curled into himself feebly in what he must’ve feared were his assailant’s arms. After a moment of silence, Robert tilted his head downward so the bridge of his nose rested on Henry’s shoulder and his mouth was free to speak.

“Why in all the world would you think I would ever hurt you?” Robert got no response. This was bad. Robert was not a violent person, and never has been. Henry knew this.

A realization then dawned on Robert with a painful sting. Robert was a logical man with incredible self-control. He would never hurt anybody on impulse; it was even rare for him to do it reflexively. He’d never done anything like that without reason. It dawned on him that somewhere in Henry’s mind, he fully believed that it would be reasonable for him to be hurt. This realization cracked Robert to his very core. “No, no, no, Henry… Henry, No!” He whispered to the frightened man in his arms. “Please, Henry. You don’t need to tell me what’s going on right now, I just need you to know that I could never ever be mad enough... to hurt you. I will never in my life get to that point. It’s impossible. The thought hasn’t ever crossed my mind in all the time I’ve known you, and it never will. I’m not angry. I never was angry. Right now, please, Henry, this is all I want you to know.” Finally, his ramblings came to an end.

There was silence for a very long time. Robert felt Henry shift a small bit before freezing again. More silence. Robert felt like he was going to be sick with worry. He wanted Henry to feel safe so badly. He would do or give anything if it made his dear Henry come back from this terror. Nothing mattered more to him now. Absolutely nothing.

In the middle of his thoughts, Robert felt the cloth on his back shift. His breath caught as he felt Henry’s cold hands finally grip the back of his shirt, returning his embrace. Robert’s head lifted as Henry’s fell onto his shoulder, and just like that, Henry crumpled in his arms. He felt a shudder, and then a sob rupture from Henry’s throat. He felt the frailty of the man in his arms as his cries wracked his entire frame with every breath he took.

Robert couldn’t pin down any of the hundreds of thoughts and feelings spiraling in his head, but thankfully, his heart didn’t seem to need permission from his head to react the way it felt it needed to. Robert’s hand rose and started drawing slow, gentle circles on the crying man’s back. Henry’s unkempt shirt moved along with his hand in the soothing, repetitive motions. Henry shook more, only for a second, and then he shifted to hug Robert tighter, as if he would never get to hold him again.

Every once in a while, Robert would hear Henry hold his breath to say something, only for sobbing to follow, just barely louder than before. The thunder cracked outside, and Robert made sure his hand motions were slow and caring as Henry recoiled at the sound. Clearly being startled by the crackling noise, Henry went quiet for a moment. His crying then returned, and was noticeably softer than before. The volume decreased even further as Robert continued to draw his hand in slow circles for what seemed to be minutes. He felt like it was putting Henry into a trance seeing as how the grip on his shirt loosened and he leaned into Robert’s hold. His breaths were slow now, and Robert finally felt like he could let himself breathe.

Henry was cold - very, very cold.

“Henry?” Robert softly spoke. He felt Henry’s head just barely lift off his shoulder in response. “Would you mind if I sleep here in your room tonight? I don’t want to go home right now.” There was a moment of silence before he felt Henry nod. “Alright. Please sit down,” Robert instructed. Henry followed orders, not having the energy to do much else. Robert walked into the kitchen, filled up a glass of water, and brought it back to Henry, who already looked like he was about to drop into unconsciousness right then and there.

Henry stared at the glass now in his hand for a long time. Robert had to outright tell him to drink it for Henry to finally oblige. Once the glass was empty, Robert took it from him and set it on his nightstand. He instructed Henry to lay down and get under his covers. Once he did, Robert pulled the blankets up to the top of his shoulders. Henry looked sad and almost ashamed at this, and stared into the sheets next to his eyes. Robert furrowed his brows.

“Should I sleep on the couch,” he asked, pointing to said couch against the wall, “or should I sleep here?” He pointed to the bed. He was worried that the request would be a bit odd to Henry, but he couldn’t stop himself from asking. Henry grabbed the pillow underneath the one he was resting on and hugged it, nodding.

“You can sleep here.” Robert froze for a moment, shocked that Henry could speak at all. Henry’s words were softer than Robert thought possible. It had been so long since he’d heard that voice, and it ran like silk through his head. He nodded and walked over to the foot of the bed so he could climb his way onto the side where he would be closest to the wall. He slipped under the sheets and blanket and inched toward Henry, who was only illuminated by the candle on his desk, still facing away from him.

The thunder stopped, and only pouring rain was left tapping as white noise against the window. After all the excitement of the night, Robert felt his eyes burn with drowsiness every time he blinked. The skittering of probably invisible mice could be heard in the ceiling above their heads, but the sound was dwarfed by the rain and wind that howled and hissed just outside. Robert knew that Henry had a lot of trouble sleeping, but he was probably just as drained of energy as Robert was after their confrontation.

Robert knew that he would fall asleep soon, but found himself staring at the back of Henry’s head, thinking to himself. He felt an unusual pull toward this man. This was like nothing he’d felt for anyone before. When Henry was in trouble, Robert’s mind would instantly rid itself of all complexity and become incapable of thinking about anything but Henry’s safety and well-being. This happened in the alleyway, and it happened again during the confrontation. Robert liked to think himself a man of logic and reason. It made no sense for these traits to go away in the presence of any one man. How could this happen and why? Robert was not a very introspective man, as he didn’t enjoy thinking about himself much, but the questions raised by his recent thoughts, feelings, and actions were just too much for him to let lie and forget about.

The first thought that came to mind as to why this happened was immediately shoved right back down and had a blind eye turned to it as Robert felt his face suddenly fill with a gentle warmth. He would think about that some other time. He sighed and pondered these questions more.

Mindlessly, Robert lifted his hand and gingerly ran his fingers through Henry’s hair. He watched and listened as Henry’s breath hitched at the feeling and his body stiffened a small bit. Robert felt his own chest flutter. Being this close to his dearest Henry felt nicer than any feeling he’d felt in a very long time. Robert continued his movements, and before he knew it, Henry’s tensed muscles loosened greatly and his breathing slowed.

Robert didn’t even realize that Henry had fallen asleep until he heard soft, quiet snoring bubbling from the man lying in front of him. He listened to Henry’s breathing for a while, finding bliss in the peaceful sound.

Now that Henry had fallen asleep, an unknown and unwelcome switch flipped in Robert’s brain. He began thinking more about his confrontation with Henry.

He began thinking about what Henry must’ve been thinking and feeling in the heat of the moment. Henry had actually been scared of him. This thought must’ve not sunk in properly in Robert’s mind, because now, it hit him like he was being stoned to death. Robert had never been violent with anybody before in his entire life, not even when drunk. Henry had never heard him threaten anyone or even speak with too much mal-intent toward anybody. Robert could only come to the extremely saddening realization that it may have been self-loathing that fed Henry’s fear of attack.

Henry had genuinely believed that Robert was going to hurt him. The thought was unfathomable and took a moment to truly process through his brain. Henry was the sweetest man Robert had ever known. He would never deserve such violence - never in his entire life. At this thought, extremely unwelcome mental images forced their way into Robert’s mind, and as much as he tried, he couldn’t stop them. He saw Henry being grabbed by his shirt collar, thrown to the ground, and struck over and over and over by someone’s fist. He saw their shoe connect fast with Henry’s stomach as he cried out in pain and sobbed helplessly at the furious and vicious attack. He saw blood leaking from Henry’s mouth while, in between dreadful wails, coughs wracked his entire fragile body. He saw the person wait for Henry to catch his breath and get to his hands and knees, trembling beneath them, before winding up their leg and kicking him sharply in the ribs with a sickening crack. He saw Henry shriek in absolute agony.

Robert closed his eyes hard and opened them repeatedly, trying to get these images out of his head. This was exactly what Henry had been bracing for as he flinched and whimpered at Robert’s every movement. He was preparing himself for what he just knew was to come. He was preparing himself for that.

Robert felt sick to his stomach. He would be willing and ready to mangle anyone who would dare do such things to his sweet and loving Henry. Robert grounded himself by focusing on the feeling of Henry’s hair between his fingers. It was soft, but unkempt and clearly neglected. His hair was thinner than normal - an obvious sign of stress. Regardless, he gently felt it anyway. He had to do this for a few minutes before he finally managed to calm himself down.

By then, Robert’s arm began to ache. He stopped petting Henry’s hair and slowly draped his arm over Henry’s sleeping form, careful not to wake him. Henry was out cold, however, and didn’t even have a chance of waking up at something so small. Robert wanted to make sure Henry was there in the morning, and having his arm around him made sure of that.

One by one, Robert’s thoughts and feelings vanished into the abyss of impending sleep. Worry, curiosity, gratefulness, relief, sorrow - they all fell away like leaves on an autumn tree. Before long, Robert felt a void engulf him in a potent nothing.

The hum of the rain spattering against the glass was the final sound Robert heard before he finally fell into a deep sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

Nothing felt real to Henry anymore. Not even the pillow that his head rested upon. Not even the blanket that surrounded him. Time felt like a thick, viscous syrup that he was wading through, even as he laid still in his bed. He couldn’t remember all of what happened the previous night, or even if it happened at all. Drinking heavily had become common for Henry after what happened in the alleyway. His life was over, after all. What benefit would there be to take care of himself anymore? There was no reason to supply a dead man with the means to live.

Yes, it had all been a dream. A dream or a drunken hallucination brought on by misery. That’s what had happened for sure. How could Henry even consider the possibility of being forgiven? That wouldn’t make any sense, truly.

Upon taking a deep breath of submission, Henry noted the weight that pressed down on his left shoulder. The pressure drew his eyes downward only to see the arm of none other than Robert draped over his very own. At the realization that the previous day’s events had actually occurred, Henry felt a jolting of contradictory feelings. On the small hand, Henry felt relieved that he wasn’t hallucinating or dreaming, and on the other hand, he felt a powerful guilt. He couldn’t quite place the epicenter of the guilt, but it burrowed into his stomach nonetheless.

Robert hadn’t attacked Henry the night before. This simply didn’t make any sense. Perhaps Robert wasn’t the man of reason Henry took him for. Regardless, Henry moved to stand. If he couldn’t make up for his guest’s undeniable mercy, then he could at least make him some breakfast.

Henry gently wrapped his fingers around Robert’s wrist to lift it off of his arm. He didn’t want to wake dear Robert if he didn’t have to. He managed to get himself upright with his legs hanging over the bedside before he gently placed his guest’s arm down on the blanket beside him. He then moved to stand.

Still drowsy from waking up, the last thing Henry anticipated was Robert’s hand shooting back out and grabbing onto his arm. Henry jumped, but Robert held firm. His head lifted from his pillow, and he spoke in a raspy and sleepy tone. “Nonononono, please don’t leave, Henry, please,” Robert begged him.

Henry didn’t understand what he meant. Taking a shot in the dark, Henry put his hand on the sleeve of Robert’s outstretched arm and informed him, “I… I’m not going to leave, I’m just going to make breakfast, that’s all. I’ll be in the kitchen; I won’t leave my room.”

Robert noticeably relaxed at this information. Henry figured that Robert had spent a lot of time tracking him down, so of course he wouldn’t want to have wasted his valuable time on him, of all people. Surely that was the reason why Robert’s expression was so, so much happier now.

Henry lifted himself from bed and walked toward the kitchen door, significantly less tired than before from the scare. He left the door open so Robert could hear him cook and know that he wasn’t going to suddenly make a run for it. He turned on the gas for the stove and laid a medium sized pan on the front right burner. He put a fair amount of butter in it, and after it began to sizzle, he cracked two eggs in and immediately broke the yolks, beginning to swish them around the pan.

Only then did Henry hear a voice exclaim from the bedroom, “Wait, you can cook?!” Henry tried to hold in laughter at the extremely delayed reaction, but couldn’t quite pull it off, resulting in a strange reverse snort.

“Yes, I can cook a little,” Henry informed his guest.

“Well what’s Rachael here for then?!”

“I can’t cook for every person living here, Robert.” Henry chuckled.

Robert ignored his question and eagerly continued, “Oh, go on, then! What can you cook? We’ve lived in the same dorm for years and I’ve never once seen you cook anything!”

Henry smiled at his friend’s excited disbelief. “Well I always did it when you weren’t around.”

“You always told me you got food from the cafeteria! Why would you let them take credit for your food?!”

“Because it was bad, Robert! It was bad! It was bad food!” At this blunt admission, Robert absolutely cracked up, and Henry simply couldn’t help but follow suit. Afterward, he said, “I can pretty much only cook the basics. Eggs, bread, some meats, and maybe the occasional tray of cookies. Nothing really special.”

“Well that’s better than I can do. I could burn down this very building making a glass of water.”

Henry chuckled and shook his head. “Nonsense - you’ve cut an apple before.”

“Perhaps, but I barely made it out with my hand still attached to my arm.”

“Oh, stop it, Lanyon!” Henry felt a grin toy with his features as he listened to Robert revel in his reaction. Henry began to feel a growing fluttering sensation in his stomach that briefly drew his attention away from the moment.

“I’m really tired,” Robert stated drowsily.

“Well go back to sleep then. I’ll wake you up when breakfast is ready. It won’t be long.”

“Okay,” Robert responded simply. Henry knew that Robert probably wasn’t used to staying up as late as he did, so he wasn’t surprised when he heard nothing more come from his bedroom. Robert was likely already asleep.

Henry felt the fluttering in his stomach increase the more he thought about their interaction. Henry hadn’t smiled in so many weeks. This thick fog that he constantly felt like he was swimming through could truly only be cleared by Robert, Henry thought to himself. Robert’s presence chased away the worries of his head and made it all around easier for him to enjoy himself. This never happened with anybody else Henry had ever met. Perhaps that’s why he fancied him so much.

Henry slapped these contemplations backward, becoming embarrassed at the thought as well as the ones he knew would soon follow. He could successfully fight off these thoughts, but as per usual, he could not shoo the warmth that then spread over his face.

He lost track of the eggs in his thoughts and checked in on their progress. They looked almost done, but he wanted to make sure they were of perfect quality, so he would keep them there for now. Robert liked them with some crispy bits, anyway.

_‘Eggs..’_

Henry jumped so hard that it shifted the pan off the heat for a moment and he had to pull it back. It was Edward, of course. He had lived with the specter in his head for several years now. Henry wondered how he still managed to startle him like this.

_‘Because those with guilty consciences are easy to scare,’_ Edward answered, reading his thoughts with a matter-of-fact tone.

“What? What do you want?” Henry muttered, trying and failing to sound brave. “What about the eggs?”

_‘Oh, nothing. It’s just… what a pathetic bribe,’_ Edward remarked curiously.

Henry hoped Edward couldn’t tell that he knew exactly what he was talking about. He knew that he could, though.

“Why are you so persistent in making my life miserable? All I’m doing right now is making eggs. Why can’t you just leave me alone?”

Edward was not used to Henry standing up for himself anymore, but he remained calm, as he knew how to handle the situation. He knew how to tame this man again. He knew how to bring him to his knees. He knew how to put him back in his place.

_‘Trying to make your life… miserable? Me?’_ Hyde asked, replicating a voice of genuine confusion, _‘I’m just explaining to you the situation that you so desperately try to ignore. You want to drown yourself in this fantasy of redemption. You take such great pleasure in the idea that your life isn’t over, well… everything I do here is bringing you back to real life.’_

Henry grew quiet.

_‘Oh, come now, you know it’s true. Lanyon could’ve and really should’ve beaten you last night. At least struck you once! But he didn’t. And scrambled eggs are what you give him in return… A beautiful metaphor for your relationship with him, isn’t it?’_

Henry simply had nothing to fight back with. Once again, he stood there and took it, beginning to feel the urge to sadly nod along with everything Edward said.

_‘Don’t you see what’s going on here? ...Oh, you’re so naive.’_ Henry became confused. What could Edward possibly say now that Henry didn’t know already? What more could there be for Henry to hate himself for?

_‘Have you ever heard of Stockholm syndrome, dear Jekyll?’_

Henry’s stomach dropped.

_‘What you’ve caught your self-proclaimed dearest friend and truly your childish crush in, is a cage he can’t see and doesn’t know is there. You knew all along that he would help you, but you didn’t try to stop him.’_

Now, this was simply wrong. Henry knew that for sure. “I didn’t know _or_ think that he-“

_‘You knew damn well! How dare you lie to me!’_ Henry shrank back immediately. _‘I thought that you quarantining yourself from everyone for the past few weeks was a step in the right direction. You finally figured out and now fully know how much of a handicap you are to people’s lives, so doing what you’re doing to Lanyon now is truly despicable, and you know it.’_

Henry didn’t even think about retaliating. Edward’s gaslighting was always quite potent to Henry, but with him so fragile and vulnerable now, it didn’t take much to break him down. He accepted it without a fight. After all, Edward spent every waking moment in Henry’s head. Surely he knew what he was talking about.

_‘You’ve caught this innocent man in your disgusting clutches and are using him because you know he’ll take care of you when you truly and utterly don’t deserve it. Listen to me, Jekyll. I hate Lanyon, and even I don’t think he’d ever deserve this.’_

Henry felt like he was going to vomit. Edward was right, wasn’t he? How could he have been so cruel? Tears welled in Henry’s eyes and began streaming down his cheeks. He shuddered and his face crumpled. He then closed his eyes. He couldn’t bear to even look at the specter any longer. Edward didn’t deserve that. Nobody deserved to be punished by his presence - not people that he loved, or even people that he hated.

Scrambled eggs were no longer on his mind.

~~~~~~~~~~

Robert smelled smoke.

Certainly not what he was expecting, but there it was, pouring like a river out from the ceiling of the kitchen. Robert shot up. “Henry?” He called out, sounding a bit more nervous than he intended. There was no response. Robert immediately swung himself out of bed and sped over to the kitchen. Peering in, he saw Henry sitting against the oven door, clutching himself by the abdomen, his knees curled up to his chin. He appeared to be in a daze, not responding to Robert’s presence and giving a thousand-mile stare to the cabinets in front of him. Tears were spilling out of his eyes, but his face laid flat and silent. The sight was enough to chill Robert to his very core.

Only then did Robert notice the source of the smoke. Whatever Henry had been cooking had turned into a blackened pile of inedible charcoal. Robert rushed over and turned the gas off, quickly pulling the pan off the heat. He unlocked the nearby window and opened it, letting the room breathe once again. Then, without a moment of hesitation, he knelt down and put a hand on Henry’s shoulder.

Henry jumped. He turned his head ever so slightly and pointed his eyes in Robert’s general direction, but at no point did he ever look directly at him.

“Henry, what’s wrong? ...Henry!” Robert shakily prompted.

Henry began to give the thousand-mile stare once again, and Robert worried that he wouldn’t stop, but Henry then spoke. “He never leaves me alone.” Henry’s voice was wispy and cracked, but still audible. “And I deserve it… You don’t deserve this… I deserve this... I deserve my pain… I deserve it.”

A chill crawled up Robert’s spine hearing Henry madly ramble the way he did. He gripped Henry’s shoulder tighter and watched as this seemed to bring him back to reality. He looked up at Robert, but only for a second before his eyes darted away with noticeable intention.

“Henry, I want you to stand up,” Robert instructed. Henry, after quite a long moment of hesitation, followed the orders and got to his feet. Robert gingerly led Henry out of the still smokey room and set him back on the bed. He sat to Henry’s left and looked at him. They both said nothing and sat there for a while, Henry absolutely refusing to look at any part of Robert.

He waited until Henry looked rather tired. He then began to rub Henry’s back much like he did the night before. He, for a while, looked like he was enjoying it, but then, out of the blue, he gently pushed Robert’s hand back.

Robert let the silence linger for a while before he softly asked Henry, “Are you okay? What happened?” Henry didn’t respond. “Um… What did you mean when you said ‘he won’t leave me alone?’”

Robert didn’t press any further and let Henry sit with the question for a little while. “Edward is always in my head,” he finally responded. Robert paused.

“Like… he speaks to you?” Robert suggested. Henry nodded.

“Nobody ever knows, but he’s there. Only I can see him and only I can hear him.” Robert waited for Henry to continue, but he didn’t.

Robert furrowed his brows and worried, but tried calmly asking, “How does this whole thing work? ...With you and… Edward.” Saying Hyde’s first name felt a bit odd coming off of his tongue, but he said it nonetheless. If that’s what Henry called him, then that’s what Robert would call him.

“He, um,” Henry began. “He… well…” Henry returned to a state of silence. Robert looked at him and saw apprehension etched into his face. Robert paused for a while. The last thing he wanted was for Henry to be scared again. The image of his face from the night before had been burned into his brain forever. Henry had shook so terribly that night. He flinched so sharply, yelped so loudly, and cried so dolefully. The scene had haunted him throughout the night.

Before he knew what he was doing, Robert’s arms found themselves wrapped around Henry’s.

Robert pulled back pretty quickly, realizing that Henry may not want to be touched. He did push his hand away before, after all. He scrambled to save face, suggesting what he’d been considering for a while.

“How about I start, hm? I feel like I might’ve pieced together some of what’s been going on, so… maybe I could start, and then you correct me whenever I’m wrong. Does that sound good?” Robert knew this was a bit risky, but at the same time, he knew that Henry may not be ready to lead this discussion just yet.

Henry nodded sheepishly and grabbed a pillow from the bed to hug it. He hunched over it and waited for Robert to begin.

“Okay,” Robert started, “so it seems that Edward Hyde is the result of your experiments from college. Am I correct in that assumption?” Henry nodded. “Okay, so Edward is your evil half? Did the potion successfully split... the two apart?”

“I don’t think the potion changed me; I just think it gave the darker parts of me a consciousness,” Henry explained. “I don’t even know if Edward is evil, truthfully. He’s an embodiment and extreme exacerbation of repression, I believe. He shows up on every reflective surface, and when there is none, he appears to me like a ghost. He hates me. He hates me a lot.” Henry was silent for a moment before continuing. “He always wants to come out and be free at night. We swap places in my mind whenever I drink the potion and he takes control of my body until either the potion’s effects run out, or he drinks the potion early, himself. I used to do this just to keep him quiet, but it’s gotten worse recently. He’s always whispering to me, reminding me of how terrible and fake I am. He tells me everything that’s wrong with me, and he’s not wrong to do so.”

Robert patiently waited as Henry halted his explanation. He couldn’t possibly imagine what being in Henry’s head must have felt like. All he was sure of was the anger that boiled in his gut at the insinuation that someone was lying to Henry and telling him that he was a horrible person until he broke down and became the man that shrank at every loud noise or sudden movement that came upon him. He was likely responsible for Henry’s fear of being beaten the previous night. This thought made Robert positively furious, but he compressed his feelings and tried to keep them at bay until Henry was done with his explanation. He could be missing out on some information, after all.

“...All of Edward is me. No part of him was pulled from Hell or any kind of ethereal plane - it’s all just me, but deep down,” stated Henry. “Everyone who hates him hates me, too. And that’s a lot of people. Rest assured, though, he has a reason to hate me. I brought him into this world, and I’m the one that controls when he lives. At all other times, he’s trapped inside me, watching the world like a play he was promised a role in. He’s sentient, and I brought him into this torturous existence. It’s no wonder he hates me with all his life.”

“But Edward has always been a part of you. That means he created himself, too,” Robert softly pressed. “You both share responsibility for his existence. You can’t just pile it on yourself like that. It’s not right.”

“...I don’t know,” Henry murmured.

Robert simply couldn’t stand Henry’s pained expression anymore, and he found himself drawing his arms around him once again. This time, he let Robert do as he pleased without protest. This didn’t stop the guilty look on his face, however. Robert could tell that Edward was saying something to him, but he couldn’t quite tell what.

The information Henry had given him was overwhelming. He didn’t know quite what to think or how to feel about it. For a long while, he had a suspicion toward and mild distaste for Edward, but knowing now that he was just a different facet of Henry, all he felt was cold when he thought of him.

Henry’s stomach then growled.

At this point, Robert noticed how hungry he was as well. Neither of them had gotten breakfast this morning, and it clearly started to show. Robert became curious. He felt Henry now and remembered how he felt the previous night. Henry was thin. Thinner than he normally was, Robert thought. He was tempted to ask Henry when the last time he’d eaten was, but decided rather firmly against it.

Robert broke the embrace and looked at Henry, tilting his head. “Can we get some breakfast? I can go down to Rachel. She makes the best breakfasts.” Henry remained silent but eventually glanced at him and nodded in response.

“I don’t think I can go downstairs, though,” he said diffidently.

“That’s okay, I can go down there myself. It might take awhile before I come back up, though. What do you want?”

Henry stayed quiet for a moment and then relayed his order. All it was was some plain sourdough bread and some water. Robert convinced him to get some milk, too, as he might need the protein, but that was all he could do. “Alright, I’ll be back, Henry. Please don’t go anywhere, okay?” Henry nodded guiltily and looked at the floor.

“Okay, I’ll be right back,” Robert repeated reassuringly as he headed out the door. As quietly as he could, he closed it, and headed for the stairs.

Truly, not the greatest start to their morning, but a start nonetheless, and that was well more than good enough for him.


	4. 4

It had taken longer than expected for Robert to get his meal, especially with Rachel practically interrogating him about how Henry was doing. He had assured her that Henry was just fine, but very tired, and needed a lot of extra rest. He had told her that “the poor sod has simply overworked himself recently,” which he didn’t think was entirely a lie, but he knew wasn’t the full truth. No doubt Henry had in fact spent the days before Robert saved him from the alley holed up in his room slaving away over paperwork he needed to keep up to date with while Hyde hounded him from behind. Robert joked to her about how he would be mothering him for the next few days so he wouldn’t forget to eat, sleep, and blink every once in a while. His confident voice and sense of humor greatly loosened the mood, and Rachel finally surrendered to him his small tray of food and sent him on his merry way, telling Robert to let Henry know that she says, “Get some rest and get well soon.”

“I will,” he lied, “thanks!” The last thing Henry needed was to be worried even more than he already was, and Robert knew that Henry didn’t want any attention to be drawn to him.

He started up the stairs, anxiety beginning to bubble inside him, not too dissimilar to the night before. He started to worry if something was wrong. Had Henry taken off? Had something happened? The tray in his hands shifting slightly off balance brought him back to reality as he frantically steadied the metal dinner bells back to the way they were.

He sighed as he approached Henry’s door. Even if something was wrong, it was nothing he couldn’t handle, right?

Robert didn’t bother knocking and opened the door to find a sight that made his stomach twist. Henry sat, swaying on his bed, a quite sizeable wine bottle in his curled fingers, half empty. Robert prayed hopelessly that the bottle wasn’t newly opened. Henry already looked rather drunk, and hadn’t noticed Robert entering. In his mind, he spat at himself about what a god awful idea it was to leave him alone like that.

“Henry?” The man in question jumped so suddenly at his voice that it startled Robert, too. His frightened eyes snapped to Robert as he clutched his wine bottle. Robert stepped into the room and set the food tray on the writing desk between the door and the couch. He then turned to close and lock the door. He walked over to Henry slowly.

“It’s okay, Henry. Calm down,” Robert softly plead. Henry’s stomach growled. “Please eat something. I have your bread. And… And I have a boiled egg, in case you’re still hungry after that. Here’s your mil-”

“No,” Henry said flatly. Robert paused in the middle of reaching for the glass of milk. Henry sniffed sharply and looked at him, still scared, but a bit more firm than before. “Don gimme any food,” he slurred.

“W...Why?”

“S’no good,” Henry answered.

“You mean… you don’t like the food?”

“No, thfood’s great, prob’ly. ‘S’jus no good for me.” Robert didn’t know what he meant by any of this. He waited for Henry to explain himself, and when he didn’t, Robert began asking him something that was immediately cut off. “S’not good for food t’be eaten by me. Someone else’d ‘njoy it, and- and they’d do more with... with what they got from it. ‘S _wasted_ … ‘S _wasted_ on me. Go give it t’someone else or eat it yourself r’somethin. Do _sssssomethin_ with it.”

Despite the tangent Henry was going on being very clearly affected by alcohol, Robert’s heart stung so incredibly painfully at the insinuation that Henry didn’t believe he was worth basic food.

Robert slowly reached for the wine bottle. “Henry, um… can I-” The moment Robert’s fingers met with the skin of Henry’s clenched hand, he flinched away sharply. Robert pulled back at this and paused.

“...‘M sorry,” Henry muttered, shame clear in his face. “I’ll go putit away.”

Henry moved to stand, so Robert quickly followed him. He swayed upon getting to his feet, but Robert was right there, ready to help him stay upright. Henry weakly attempted to tell him that he was fine, but Robert rightfully didn’t believe him. Henry began walking with Robert by his side toward the pile of empty bottles in the corner by the bathroom and kitchen doors. If that was where Henry wanted to put them for now, Robert was fine with that. He would tidy the room up later anyway. Henry swayed again, and Robert caught him, stopping his thoughts to consider just how much alcohol Henry had consumed in such a small amount of time. Surely Henry was feeling very sick on top of tipsy right about now.

The third time Henry swayed, the half-emptied wine bottle between his fingers slipped out of his grasp. Henry whipped out his arm in an attempt to catch the bottle but only managed to smack it from above and quicken its descent. The thin glass shattered into pieces immediately upon impact with the wooden floor. Whatever wine that remained in there splashed with startling speed in all directions, absolutely drenching the bottom of both of their pants in the soon to be sticky fluid. Henry stopped dead in his tracks.

“Oh,” Henry shakily muttered. Robert looked slowly and carefully in his friend’s direction and saw Henry’s eyes, wide with a sudden horror, staring down at the mess. Robert’s heart raced as Henry began to shake. “Oh my… God… I’m so sorry - I-I-I’m so sorry, I didn’t- I didn’t mean to, I didn’t mean to! I-I-” Henry was stuttering apologies frantically, almost desperately, as if he were scared that Robert would be furious at him for such a small inconvenience. It took a second for Robert to respond, but he barely got a single word in before Henry rushed out the words, “Don’t worry, I-I’ll clean it up.”

Before Robert could process quite what he was doing, Henry unsteadily dropped to his knees in the puddle of wine and began scooping the glass shards, big and small, into his shaking hands.

Electricity seized Robert’s heart immediately upon seeing this. He shouted sharply, “No!” before striking the glass out of Henry’s loose grip. Upon doing this, Robert felt a sting on the outside of his left hand. He sucked breath through his teeth for a split second, but grabbed the wrist of Henry’s badly cut hand in his own very tightly. “Henry, that’s glass! Broken glass! What the hell do you think you’re doing!” He yelled, shocked by Henry’s actions.

Henry stared at him, fear clear in his widened eyes. He froze for a while, looking up at Robert like a frightened animal. He nearly whispered, “I…” Then, he gasped. “Robert, you- you got cut!” he exclaimed. Robert then simply stared at him, his breath completely taken away. Surely there was no way Henry had just said that. There was no way that his sweet, darling Henry, now bleeding profusely from both of his palms, was ignoring his quite serious lacerations for what could be compared to a bad paper cut. Noticing the silence, Henry added, “You’re bleeding from the side of your hand… Do you… see it?”

“Henry!” Robert yelled. His voice was so loud compared to the silence of the room and so sudden that it caused Henry to curl in on himself, almost cowering at Robert’s assertive tone. Robert had grabbed both of his hands by this point which kept him from being able to shield himself properly. “Have you not looked at your own hands?!” His eyes flickered over Henry’s wounds and saw just how much blood was oozing from them. “Oh god, did you clench your fingers around them?! Oh, dear Christ!”

Robert turned his head to swiftly scan the room for what could be used to fix Henry’s wounds, and his eyes settled first upon the kitchen and then the bathroom. He stood and rushed to the former, searching the room for what basic items he would need. He opened a cupboard and grabbed a large wooden bowl, filling it with water at the faucet. He started back for where Henry was, and placed the bowl in front of him. He then went for the bathroom. Opening the cabinets, he found a roll of gauze, a bar of soap, some washcloths, and a towel among other things. He grabbed these items and ran back to Henry who was now curled down toward his knees, his palms facing up toward his head, his eyes staring blankly at the bowl in front of him.

Robert quickly knelt down in front of Henry and picked up the bowl, a small amount of water spilling from its side in the sudden movement. He used the towel to wipe the glass and wine that remained on the floor to the side and then set the bowl back down. He guided Henry’s hands into the water and watched as blood soon swirled out of the cuts and filled the bowl with a deep scarlet. Letting them soak for a moment, he took the time to look up at Henry’s face. His tired, squinted eyes were pointed at the floor in front of the bowl, now looking less like he was staring at nothing, and more like he was scared to look at any part of Robert directly, lest he be punished for it. Robert felt sick with worry, but directed himself back to Henry’s cuts to keep himself focused.

Robert took the tiniest washcloth and positioned it on his own left hand where he then wrapped gauze several times around it to secure its place. He wanted to make sure there was a buffer between his cut and Henry’s blood to minimize the chance that either would get infected. He knew this wasn’t great protection, but it was better than nothing. Robert instructed Henry to lift his hands out of the water, and when he did, Robert took them in his own. Henry was clearly nervous about this, but Robert tried to keep that out of his mind. He noted that some glass was still stuck in Henry’s skin.

“Henry, I’m going to have to pull these out, okay?” Robert cautioned. Henry gave no response, and Robert began to remove the glass with as much care as he could manage. Other than the occasional twitch, Henry hadn’t moved or even reacted much to what was going on. Now that Robert thought about it, he hadn’t really done much of anything since he’d yelled at him. He began to regret his actions quite a bit.

Once the remaining glass was removed, Robert dipped Henry’s hands back in the water and pulled them out. It would’ve been best to do this at the faucet where the water would be fresh, but Henry didn’t look like he was mentally capable of moving just yet. He took the bar of soap and dunked that in for a second as well, activating it. He pulled Henry’s hands closer and paused. “This is probably going to sting, Henry, but it’ll clean it.”

No response. Robert hesitated before he gently brought the bar of soap to Henry’s right hand. He made a tiny, strangled noise and twitched quite a lot as Robert moved the soap around his palm and fingers. Wincing and shutting his eyes, Henry was clearly in a lot of pain. Robert wondered for a second why Henry’s pain was worse with soap than it was with shards of glass, as if one was foreign and the other was familiar. The thought unsettled him deeply.

Robert was about to guide Henry’s hand back into the water when he stopped. “We should really be doing this at a faucet,” said Robert, breaking the silence. “Let’s go to the kitchen.”

Henry didn’t move. He didn’t even look at him. “Henry, we should go to the kitchen,” Robert insisted, raising his voice only a tiny bit to sound more firm. He knew that this tactic would get Henry out of his trance, but his reactions would always dig at his insides, his heart screaming at him that he was doing the wrong thing. Henry was bleeding, however, and this took priority in Robert’s mind, despite the gnawing in his gut.

At the change in tone, Henry shifted in place. “O-Okay,” he stuttered. Henry shakily got to his feet, nearly falling back over in the process. Robert caught him under his arms and pulled him upright. Henry politely but nervously waved him off with his more bloodied hand and he let him go.

Henry looked pale - very, very pale. Robert wondered whether it was from the nausea of the alcohol or blood loss. Either way, it worried him. Robert was about to feel sick himself just imagining what Henry must’ve been feeling.

Once in the kitchen, Robert turned on the faucet and instructed Henry to keep his hand under the running water. When Henry did as he was told, Robert considered Henry’s hands for a moment. With the water perpetually pushing blood out of the way and revealing the actual injuries, Henry’s cuts appeared to be a lot smaller than he originally thought they were. Most of them were shallow, and the ones that weren’t were quite short. Robert felt relief only for a short moment before he remembered what he needed to do in order to start a more thorough clean of Henry’s cuts. He headed back to the bedroom where he scooped up the materials he needed and brought them back to the kitchen. He kept the gauze in his hand and told Henry that he’d be right back.

Robert started for the bathroom and, after unwrapping the gauze, ran his own bleeding hand under the sink’s cold stream. He examined his own cut and noticed with slight shock just how bad it was. His hand wasn’t worse than either of Henry’s, but it wasn’t in good shape, either. While taking a spare bar of soap and running it over his hand, he wondered if he’d been imagining things. Why did Henry’s cuts appear so much more severe at the start than they actually had been? Why had his brain imagined his own cut as smaller than it actually was? Why did his brain force him to feel that Henry took such a higher priority when they were both in quite bad condition?

Robert couldn’t help but mull over these thoughts for a while. His mind had been doing some peculiar things recently. His instinctual actions in the alleyway, the unconscious movement of his hands during their confrontation, the general inability to control himself when in the presence of Henry’s crying, these were all quite strange phenomena going on in his mind, and it seemed like Robert acknowledging his strange behavior unclogged a pipe of thoughts and emotions that began flooding his brain instantly. Upon realizing what these thoughts and emotions were, he shunned them immediately, turning a blind eye to them once again in hopes that they’d go away. This was a wildly inappropriate time to be thinking about this.

As hard as he tried, however, his feelings were no longer going to tolerate being ignored. They pushed to the forefront of his mind anyway. He remembered how nice Henry’s hair had felt laced in his fingers the night before. He remembered the rather intense fluttering that entered his chest hearing Henry’s breath hitch at the touch of Robert’s fingertips. He remembered how beautiful Henry’s sleeping silhouette looked in front of the room’s last remaining candle light. Finally, Robert buckled.

“Oh sweet Christ, I love him,” Robert whispered to himself. His stomach went cold and his brain screamed in relief at his own self-confession. The whole scene was positively ridiculous. He sighed and propped himself up with his right elbow on the bathroom counter, rubbing his temples and eyebrows with his middle finger and thumb. Now was the worst time for his true feelings to break through his stubborn skull, but considering how he’d been ignoring them for years, it was astonishing that this hadn’t happened sooner.

His thoughts, like petulant children, pushed even further. His suppressed love had been seeping out of his seams every time he felt like Henry needed his help. He wanted more than anything for his beautiful smile to come back - for his eyes to shine once again with that brilliant light. He wanted Henry to be happy again, no matter what the cost would be and no matter how long it would take.

Robert loved him, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He shook his head and tried to clear his thoughts, but it didn’t work. He tried to focus on his hand under the running water, but it didn’t work. He tried clenching his hurt hand, but even that didn’t work. What finally broke the spell that held his mind hostage was the sound of Henry vomiting in the other room. Almost reflexively, Robert’s head whipped around. He quietly cursed his brain for getting caught in this mental loop when there were clearly more important things at hand.

Robert wiped down his cut, wrapped it in gauze, and headed back to the kitchen. Henry was leaning over the sink, propping himself up awkwardly with his elbows. He stiffened and then retched again. Whatever alcohol that hadn’t gotten into his system was now being violently evacuated from his stomach. He looked miserable, and while Robert’s heart cracked at the sight, he found small comfort in the affirmation that Henry wasn’t going to get any drunker.

He walked over to Henry and did nothing but put his hand on his back, seeing as how his hair was short enough that holding it back was unnecessary. After a small while, Henry was simply dry heaving, and when that stopped, his body drooped over the sink like a dehydrated leaf of lettuce. “Are you okay?” Robert asked.

It was a moment before Henry responded. “...Mhm... I think so.”

“Okay,” Robert softly spoke as he leaned forward and directed the faucet’s stream with his hand to clean the bowl of the sink. Once most of the bile had swirled down the drain, he turned his attention back to Henry.

He finished cleaning both of Henry’s hands and wrapped them in the remaining gauze. He then took one of the washcloths and dabbed it on Henry’s forehead, gently wicking the sweat away. When he was done, Henry took a step away from the sink and looked at him diffidently. Robert looked sadly back.

“Now, Henry, will you please eat?”

~~~~~~~~~~

The small lump of bread seemed to be staring at Henry with an intense hatred. He took a swig of the milk to avoid its burning gaze. The taste of bile still scorched his throat, but the milk thankfully drowned most of the sharp taste and made it tolerable.

“Henry, please eat - just half of it, if that’s all you can stomach,” the man to his left encouraged. Henry let out a tiny, half-hearted chuckle.

“What?” Robert asked.

“Usually you would scold me for eating on my bed,” Henry told him.

There was a moment of silence before Robert returned a small chuckle and leaned into him, hooking his arm around Henry’s shoulder. “Yes, I suppose I would, but this is a special occasion.”

Henry liked the touch. It felt warm and reassuring and secure. He felt a gentle flutter in his stomach at the comforting feeling.

_‘Disgusting,’_ the voice in his head chimed in as Robert pulled away to continue eating. _‘You enjoyed that, didn’t you?’_

Their brief moment of humor and comfort was gone with Edward’s words.

_‘You know it’s wrong. You enjoy every time he touches you, every time he smiles at you, and he’s none the wiser. What is wrong with you?’_

Henry felt guilt scratch up his insides. Robert didn’t know just how much joy he gained - and why - at the feeling of his touches and embraces. If he did, surely he would find Henry as disgusting and loathsome as he found himself.

_‘Remember Henry, and don’t ever forget, that he isn’t here because he wants to be. Deep down, Robert hates you. He’d rather be anywhere but here, but you know him, he’ll always hide it, even from himself. You saw how angry he was at the fact that he had to nurse you like the pathetic little child you are. A small bit of his hatred seeped out then, but he’s too polite to go full out on you. You know what you have to do-’_

“What is Edward saying to you?” Robert interjected. Henry turned his head to the man next to him with surprise. Edward was quite shocked and went dead silent. No one had ever called him out in such a way. Once the surprise wore off, and despite not materializing in the room, Henry could feel Edward’s threatening stare bore deep into him.

“Nothing. He’s saying nothing, really,” Henry lied.

“Ah, okay. Now eat, please. I mean it,” Robert instructed with a warm and sympathetic smile. Henry took a small chunk off the loaf of bread and fed himself. He chewed slowly. It had been a while since he’d sat down to eat something of this size. He felt Edward smile at his lie.

_‘There’s a good boy. Finally not burdening him with unnecessary information when you had the opportunity to. For once in your life, you’ve done something decent. Maybe you still are on the right track after all.’_ Henry felt his skin grow cold at the backhanded compliments, but didn't respond. _‘But of course, you know what you have to do now. You understand that Lanyon isn’t capable of prying himself from you on his own. You need to make him. One way or another, you need to make him leave. Scare him off, make him storm out in anger, do something that isn’t sitting back and letting him suffer and waste away for you!’_

Henry took another chunk from the bread and pushed it into his mouth. He nodded ever so slightly to Edward in agreement. He didn’t know if he could do it, but he knew that it was selfish not to try.

“Well, Henry,” Robert began, “we should probably go down to Miss Ito. She’ll have some healing salve for cuts like ours.”

“Y...Yes, yes she would,” Henry quietly agreed.

“Come along, then,” Robert instructed. Slowly, Henry got to his feet. He knew that Robert would want him to come along after his massive cock up. He knew that Robert couldn’t trust him alone.

Robert led him by the arm out the door, suggesting that after healing their cuts, they continue on a walk. He told Henry that some fresh air would do him good.

The bright lights of the society outside of his bedroom made everything feel more alive. The lodgers milling about, the sunlight streaming in through the windows, even the mildly intricate floor tiling was quite overwhelming after ducking away from it for so long. It all made time move so much faster for him.

Before he knew it, Robert stopped outside Miss Ito’s lab and knocked on the door. It didn’t take long for the woman in question to arrive and ask Robert what he needed. In his usual charming and gentlemanly way, Robert somehow managed to get her to accept that they needed healing salve without giving the reason why. Miss Ito was normally quite inquisitive, but the way Robert’s silver tongue gracefully glided through conversations ultimately turned her curiosity around for just enough time to be in and out of her lab with what they needed. Henry strongly admired Robert’s affinity for this skill.

A quick thanks to Miss Ito was given, and the two departed. They stopped by the nearest bathroom and applied the salve to their cuts, Robert reminding him that the shallow ones would heal within minutes, but the deeper ones may take around an hour to mend. The salve seemed to cauterize the cuts within a half a minute so that it could continue mending the ruptured tissue without interruption. Miss Ito sure knew how to make good healing salve. They tossed the bloody gauze in the trash bin, and were out of the bathroom before Henry knew it.


	5. Chapter 5

The walk around the society and then the block outside would’ve been delightful if it weren’t for Edward reminding him quite frequently of what he needed to do.

He obviously couldn’t do it on their walk, as it would cause quite the scene, so he settled for doing it once they entered his room again. His options were limited as to how he would go about it, so he spent quite some time on the walk debating it in his head. Scaring Robert off seemed to be the least plausible of his options. Henry wasn’t particularly frightening, and certainly wasn’t physically threatening. At the same time, Robert was significantly better built, considering that his spare time commonly consisted of fencing and generally getting out of the house, whereas Henry left his room rarely, only ever to restock on food that he could store and cook in his own kitchen. It would take a miracle for Robert to see him as an actual threat if he went that route.

An argument. That was what they needed to have. That would get him to leave. It would be difficult to pull off, but so long as he never let his guard down, Henry could have the upper hand. Within the few arguments they’d had throughout the time Robert and Henry had known each other, Henry only ever won because of his unrelenting stubbornness, and even then, it would usually be a close call. This would be a challenge, but not one he wasn’t willing to take. He would take on any challenge if it meant that Robert could finally be free.

He spent most of the walk in silence, preparing for what he knew was to come.

In between preparation, Henry considered Robert’s reaction to him picking up glass and getting himself hurt. It wasn’t too uncommon for Henry to pick up glass with his hands if he dropped it in his room. He never did it for the explicit purpose of getting himself hurt, but the chance that his skin would be pierced on accident was definitely somewhat securing. He saw the process as penitence for being so careless.

Typically, he would be rather careful so as to minimize the potential recovery time, but today, he felt such a panic wash over him that he just couldn’t control himself. Wine didn’t wash out of dress pants like Robert’s very easily, and they were no doubt expensive. On top of that, considering how the entire incident happened in the morning, Henry thought that he’d ruined Robert’s hope to be in public this day. After all, wine stains on the dress pants of someone of Robert’s social status would no doubt raise some questions from onlookers. And on top of all that, he didn’t want Robert to be angry.

Under normal circumstances, Henry’s self care after scooping glass just consisted of rinsing his hands off and holding a towel until the bleeding stopped. Robert was a doctor, though, and didn’t hesitate to nurse him far more carefully than he, himself, ever would. He took his profession seriously, so surely that was the reason why he was so thorough. Surely that was the reason why his fingers were so delicate. Surely that was the reason why his movements seemed so soft and caring.

No. Henry had to remind himself that Robert did none of this because he wanted to. He had to remind himself of how angry Robert was during the process. He was probably boiling inside the whole time, not even wanting to admit to himself just how much he hated the situation Henry had put him in.

He had to remind himself that he had cruelly abused Robert into taking care of him, and that he needed to be saved, no matter how bad Henry felt in the process.

Their walk ended up being a lot longer than what was originally intended. They went to shops, they stopped by the park, they went to Robert’s house for lunch and stayed there for a while, and the time it took to do all this added up fast, especially in the fleeting winter daylight. By the time they got back to the society’s doors, the sun had already set, and the amber street lamps were the primary source of light against the frigid sky. Henry could hear the sound of a particularly active pub in the distance, but other than that, the only sound audible was the whistling of the cold wind against his reddened ears.

It was a relief to be back inside, but he knew that the trouble to come would strip his short-lived happiness away. Robert clearly sensed that something was wrong and asked what it was.

“Oh… um…” There was a long pause. “We can talk about it in my room.” With that, Henry sealed his fate. He knew he couldn’t back out now.

The walk back up to his room was tense on his side, but Robert continued to wear an air of calm concern in the way he slowed to match Henry’s decreasing speed.

Henry didn’t want to do this, and he hated himself for that. What he was about to do was good; Edward made sure he knew that. He focused on the floor to distract himself. He already knew what he was going to say.

The door to his room closed behind them. Robert locked it and turned to face his friend.

“If you have something to say, it’s okay to say it,” Robert encouraged. Henry saddened at his words. Robert simply didn’t know what he was asking for.

It took quite a while for Henry to muster the strength to speak again. He just had to get it over with. There was no smooth segway into what he needed to do. He just needed to do it.

He just needed to say it.

“I’m going to have to ask you to leave now. Thank you for your time, Robert. It’s been nice. You can go home now.”

Robert was silent for a long time.

“I’m… sorry, I don’t think I quite understand,” said Robert, voice peppered with a nervous chuckle.

“Oh, no, you do. I want you to leave now,” Henry stated, forcing a smile. “You’ve done your job. I want you to go home.”

Another pause.

“No, Henry, I’m afraid I can’t,” Robert asserted with an anxious smile. “I mean… surely you can understand why-”

“Well, _I’m_ afraid I _don’t_ understand,” Henry stated, artificially inserting venom into his voice.

“...I-”

“What you’ve been doing here has been invasive and upsetting, my friend. I tried to be polite just now, but I’ll be blunt if I must. The truth is, I don’t want you here anymore. Please leave,” Henry demanded while still smiling, punctuating his last two words.

Robert had always placed quite a large deal of importance on privacy and the ability to keep secrets. He valued his own so much that to suggest that he would invade someone else’s was a pretty heavy blow.

The blow landed well, and Robert was instantly defensive. “W- Henry, I-I didn’t - ...I wasn’t... invading anything that didn’t need to be invaded. I need information to know how to help you with what you’re going through.”

“These are the same words a spy would spew to justify their actions when caught.”

“I’m not a spy, here, Henry! For God’s sake, I-”

“Robert, I’m going to have to ask you to leave now. If you want what’s best for me, then don’t upset me further by staying.”

Henry’s words were followed by a long silence. Robert’s demeanor slowly shifted. He finally seemed rather irked.

“Well you certainly didn’t look like you were upset by me last night,” Robert challenged as he crossed his arms.

_‘And so it begins.’_

“Well, you were wrong, Robert. I want you to leave me be. I’ve wanted you to for a while now.”

“No you haven’t,” Robert protested, crinkling his nose.

“I have. It’s not my fault you didn’t pick up on it.”

Robert narrowed his eyes, his gaze hard. “Don’t test me, Henry.”

Henry wavered at this. He seldom won an argument against this man, and remembering this fact put his false confidence under question.

No, this was what Henry wanted. All he needed to do was push him over the edge. Then, Robert would leave and eventually get over him. He would move on with his life, finally free of the cage that Henry had built around him and the utter filth that was Henry’s presence. Sure, he would feel bad about lying to Robert and making him angry, but that would just have to be the cost for his freedom. He would give anything for Robert to be free. All he had to do now was get him to show the hatred that he hid from even himself, and then, it would all be over.

“I’m simply demanding that you respect my privacy, Hastie.”

_‘Woah! Nice!’_ Edward chirped from the sidelines. Henry knew that Robert loathed being called the name given to him. He never liked the fact that he and his father shared nearly identical names and even simply hated the way it sounded. He always had people refer to him by his middle name instead, to break the implied association with his father. Henry had respected that since the day they’d met. It was a low blow, and Henry knew that fully well. This was sure to knock Robert’s calm demeanor off its feet.

Robert was stunned. There wasn’t a moment in Henry’s life where Robert had looked so hurt. “N...Now that’s just petty, Henry. What’s going on? What is the meaning of all this?”

Robert’s voice was so quiet and so desperate that it simply broke Henry’s heart. His angry facade dropped for a moment, and surprisingly, that moment was just long enough for Robert to catch a glimpse of what was underneath.

“Henry, uh-”

“You heard what I’ve said.” Henry’s voice and face hardened again. “I want you to leave. It’s as simple as that. Go away.”

Robert paused and then his expression turned to a determined one. “That’s not going to happen. It’s as simple as that. I’m staying,” he mirrored.

Now it was Henry’s turn to be frustrated. Why was he making this so difficult? Why was he fighting this so much? “Go away, Lanyon! I don’t want you here! I want you to go home!” He nearly yelled.

Robert paused for a long time at his words, looking him up and down for clues as to what was going on. The pause and stare was enough to make Henry look away, feeling scrutinized and embarrassed. He knew what the stare meant. Robert was preparing for a rather brutal rebuttal. It was a common practice of his in their arguments. Of course, whatever it was, Henry was prepared to fight it. It wouldn’t be long now. Robert had to give up at some point.

Robert then finally broke the silence.

“Oh…”

Henry hesitated before looking back toward the man that had been challenging him. Robert no longer wore the frustrated expression of a puzzled man. He looked as if he’d finally solved the world’s hardest riddle. His face was placid and stern.

“Henry. I know what you’re doing.”

Henry’s heart stopped.

“No you don’t! I-I’m not doing anything! You don’t know anything! Stop pretending like you know what’s going on!”

“Henry…” Robert’s face wore that of sympathy now. He slowly walked toward him. Henry was breaking. He had figured him out.

No, there was still hope. Maybe he didn’t know. Maybe he was simply bluffing.

“No, Robert, you heard what I said! Go away! Why won’t you listen to me?! For God’s sake, just leave! I… I-I hate you!”

By the time Henry had hesitantly pulled his last card, Robert was right in front of him, peering down toward his face with a sad expression, completely unphased. Henry had nearly burst into tears saying those words. They made him feel like he was going to have a heart attack. Never had he told such an outlandish and terrible lie before, and Robert saw right through him. He couldn’t bring himself to meet the tall man’s gaze.

Without knowing what he was doing, Henry slightly curled in on himself and ducked his head to the side. Robert slowly extended his right hand and grabbed Henry’s left.

Henry found himself not resisting.

Edward was roaring in his head, telling him not to stop - that he was so close to pushing him over the edge and that if he tried just a little bit harder, he would succeed. It turned out, however, that Henry was fresh out of steam for this fight. He had nothing left to fight with. He let Robert do as he pleased.

Robert enveloped Henry’s hand with both of his own and brought them to his chest. This contact brought Henry out of his head quite a bit. Even Edward paused at this gesture. He looked up only a small bit.

“Henry… I want nothing more than for you to tell me what is going through your head right now. Please… Please don’t worry, and just tell me. Please just let it out.”

Henry was quiet for a while, and for the first time in so long, Edward was the same.

“I… You…” he muttered.

Then, he cracked.

“Why won’t you leave? You would be better off rid of me,” Henry slowly admitted, a whimper seeping out of his mouth.

“Oh, Henry,” Robert whispered as he pulled him into a hug.

“No, no, don’t,” Henry weakly protested, pushing Robert, his slow voice choked with tears. Robert held on tight and didn’t budge. “No, you should go home. You should go back to before you saw me in the alley. You should go back to being happy. Go back, Robert, go back...”

This was all his fault. After all this time, Robert was still okay with him leeching his joy and life away. After all he had done, he couldn’t free him from the loathsome evil deep inside Henry’s soul that kept his best friend from real happiness. After all he tried, he couldn’t free the person that mattered most to him. And now, it was too late. Henry sobbed.

“You should never have met me!”

Robert pulled back, so shocked and so hurt looking that it completely dwarfed the way he looked when he’d called him by the wrong name.

“I’ve been nothing but a burden on you and we both know it! You hate me deep down! And you should! I’m a rotten human being who does nothing but take and take and take! I’m disgusting! You deserve so much better! I belong with the rest of the garbage outside - eaten by stray dogs and rats and never to be seen again!”

Henry slid to the floor by his bed, finally admitting all that he’d kept suppressed in his mind for so, so long. He fell on his left side and curled up on the cold, wooden floor, gravity pulling his streaking tears down with it. Robert, who was following his movements, was still holding Henry’s hand tightly in his own.

“I deserve to be dragged into a dark alley, thrown into a puddle of slush, and beaten until I can’t move! I deserve to freeze out there and die alone!”

Henry felt a cold, prickly fuzz in his brain as he spoke. He felt like he was dying.

“You don’t know how great your life would be without me in it! It’s okay that you hate me! Please! Please just admit to yourself what you really feel about me! It’s okay to do it! Just say it! Say it and you’ll feel better! Please!”

Henry was hyperventilating. He tried to pull his hand back, but Robert held it firm. He tugged and tugged and tugged, but Robert simply wouldn’t let go. He tried looking up at the man above him, but couldn’t see through his tears. Part of him was glad that he couldn’t.

A few moments passed, and Robert finally let go of his hand. Instantly, Henry tucked both of them tightly under his arms, leaving no room for either of them to be grabbed again. His breathing quickened. Robert should be rid of him, not attached to him by his hand. He curled his knees as close to his chin as they could go, ignoring the pain this brought to his now compressed arms and diaphragm. Surely Robert wouldn’t be able to grab his hand now. He wouldn’t be able to chain himself up in this invisible prison anymore. The cage door was unlocked, and now, Robert could finally be free. All he had to do was leave it.

Henry’s sobbing kept him from seeing and feeling the world around him. He only noticed arms wedging themselves under his curled form and picking him up when his head lifted off the floor, followed by the rest of his body. Robert struggled for a moment, but eventually situated Henry on his lap, his legs hanging over Robert’s right thigh. Robert shifted so he was sitting against the bed and both his arms were supporting Henry’s back by curling around each side.

“...N-No, I-” Henry uttered weakly.

Robert shushed him with such a soft and quiet voice that Henry simply had no choice but to obey.

Robert then took a deep breath and began rocking him back and forth, closing his eyes and humming a quiet lullaby in Henry’s ear.

Edward was on the verge of protesting, but noticeably stopped himself. There was no energy left in him to fight, but more importantly, it seemed that he didn’t want to. Henry felt the way Robert smoothly and slowly swayed from side to side. He felt the vibration of the low notes against his ear, and it made his heart feel warm.

It felt so nice.

Robert moved the fingers of his left hand and combed them through the back of Henry’s hair, clearing the painful prickling in his brain and replacing it with a soft bliss. The gentle movement of his fingers began to thaw the ice sitting in his stomach, and before he knew it, he no longer felt like he was dying.

Henry found himself lightly gripping Robert’s sleeve and playing slowly with the fabric. His outburst and sobbing left him with no energy, and because of this, he had no choice but to let Robert do as he pleased. Even if he did have energy, he didn’t know if he would fight it. Robert’s fingers felt so unbelievably nice raking through the back of his hair, and his voice was as smooth as silk as he hummed the sweet, calming tune.

Henry felt like he was under a spell. Robert took another deep breath, and Henry felt it against the side of his face. The feeling seemingly forced his lungs to take a deep breath of their own.

Henry nuzzled his face into Robert’s cravat and he felt the man press his sharp nose into his hair. Robert possessed the faint scent of cinnamon and coffee, and that was what finally got the last of Henry’s lingering misery and shame to disappear.

It was the simple things that Henry positively loved about this man.

~~~~~~~~~~

A half an hour likely past while Henry sat, cradled in Robert’s arms. It was late. He didn’t know how late, but he knew it was late.

Henry blinked. He did not feel the burning in his eyes that one should when one wishes to sleep. His insufferable insomnia kept him awake, but Robert’s gentle movements and soft caresses kept him paralyzed.

Eventually, Robert pulled back and stopped humming. He probably caught the look of bliss on Henry’s face judging by how tenderly he then smiled down at him. Henry felt heat rush to his face and ducked his head back down. Robert chuckled.

A moment passed and Robert sighed. Henry peered back up to see a wistful look on his friend’s face. He must’ve caught Henry staring, as he quickly looked away and cleared his throat.

“I um…” Robert began.

Another sigh came from his mouth. “...You really, really want to know how I truly feel about you, don’t you?” he muttered.

Henry had enjoyed his bliss while it lasted, but of course it had to leave him eventually. He felt a vague fear slither back into his stomach. He took a deep, quiet breath and readied himself. If Robert was about to finally admit his hatred, he knew he should be there for him during the process. His gaze finally rested on Robert’s eyes.

“More than anything,” Henry promised.

“Okay,” Robert agreed, “perhaps it is your right to know.”

Robert’s puffed cheeks clearly indicated that he was searching desperately for the right words to say. “It’s…” Robert held his breath. “Maybe now’s not the time to say it, I don’t know.”

“No matter what it is, you can say it. I hope I’ve made that very clear to you tonight,” Henry reassured.

Robert winced at Henry’s words, looking far more troubled by them than comforted. “It’s not... what you’re thinking. I know that much.” Henry became confused at this. Perhaps something else was on Robert’s mind. He let air rest in his lungs as he thought about how Robert should take as much time as he needed to process and accept his hatred, and Henry would be there for him until he does. “It’s really difficult for me to express it in words, at the moment. I have trouble with these things, you know.” Robert spoke with a nervous chuckle.

“You just need to get the ball rolling, right?” Henry suggested. Robert nodded. “Well, if you don’t know what to say, is there anything you can do to get the same message across?”

Robert appeared anxious at his question, as if he knew exactly what he could do, but desperately didn’t want to do it. Robert sighed.

“...So there is something I can do that I think will ‘get the ball rolling,’ as you said.”

“Oh... okay. You can do it if you want to.”

Robert looked very nervous, but nodded. “Okay…” he whispered to himself. Henry hadn’t the slightest clue what Robert was about to do at this point.

Robert was silent for a while, fidgeting with his hands behind Henry’s back. By this point, Henry was supporting his own back and keeping it upright himself. Robert gently met Henry’s eyes and his fidgeting slowed. He stared for a while.

Henry tried his best to hold eye contact, but it wasn’t long before he broke it, feeling embarrassed under Robert’s gaze. It was Henry’s turn to fidget with his hands now as he stared at the floor next to them. Henry hadn’t even noticed Robert’s hand moving until he felt it on his chin. As gentle as a feather, Robert pinched his chin between his thumb and the side of his index finger and pulled it back to where it had been before he’d turned away.

Henry felt his heart stumble in its rhythm.

He felt a powerful heat seep into his cheeks as Robert now made him look into his eyes. He appeared lost in his thoughts as he stared at Henry. Robert moved to cup Henry’s face in his hands and brought it closer to him. He hesitated when their faces were so close that their noses nearly touched. Robert then made one smooth, slow motion, and brought their mouths together.

In that moment, Henry forgot the world around him.

The kiss was dry, warm, and so impossibly soft. Sparklers crackled in his brain and heart. Henry’s fingers tingled as they hovered oh so close to Robert’s cravat, but never closed the distance between them. Henry was completely still.

It was a moment before Robert pulled back. He examined Henry’s face for a reaction and when he was only met with a frozen, wide-eyed stare, he explained himself.

“I do believe I’ve felt this way for quite some time now, Henry. I believe that I have… fallen in love… with you… It took me a while to accept it, but I don’t think I can hide it from myself… or from you… anymore.” Henry didn’t respond and kept his gaze fixed on Robert.

“I’m… I’m sorry. That… I really shouldn’t have done that. It wasn’t the right time or place for me to tell you all this. I should’ve waited for things to get a little better for you. I just thought that it was your right to know and… and…”

Robert slowly trailed off as he watched Henry peer hazily down at his hand and bring his fingers lightly to his lips. Henry looked back up at Robert’s face, starry-eyed.

“Can…”

Henry’s cheeks flared hot and red, his voice quiet and ever so soft.

“...Can you do that again?”

Robert’s face instantly turned into a cocktail of emotions, the most prominent of which being both relief and the expression someone would make looking at the most adorable thing imaginable.

“Oh, Henry…” The corners of Robert’s mouth were tugged into a curvy smile as he pulled Henry’s face back to his for a second kiss. Once again, the kiss was dry, but this time, it had a bit more pressure and confidence behind it. Robert broke off, his face showing more happiness and excitement than Henry had seen on it in many, many years. “Henry, I… Oh, how I love you so.”

Robert dipped his head into another kiss - this one longer than either of the others. Henry found his eyelids drifting closed, his fingers now laced deeply in Robert’s cravat, savoring the texture of everything he touched. Henry could feel Robert smile into their warm kiss, which made every movement all the sweeter. Robert’s fingers began to move softly through Henry’s hair again, and he felt himself melt right then and there.

It was a while before Robert pulled back, his hot breath lightly pouring over Henry’s face. Henry’s eyes were half-lidded as they stared into Robert’s, his lips ever so slightly parted. Once Henry was brought back to Earth, his mouth closed and his gaze darted away. Glancing back at Robert’s face, he saw a look that portrayed an impossibly deep affection.

At last, Henry felt his eyes droop with drowsiness.

“You look tired,” Robert noted. Henry drowsily nodded and hummed in agreement. A light chuckle left Robert’s mouth at this response. His fingers combed through the front of Henry’s hair, gently pulling it back and revealing his forehead. He leaned forward and placed a soft kiss on Henry’s hairline. A shy blush rose to his cheeks at the gesture, and Robert smiled down at him. “You are just adorable, Henry.”

Henry actually hid his face in the crook of Robert’s neck, flustered by his words. Robert laughed this time. “Let’s get in bed, hm?” Robert prompted.

It wasn’t long before the two changed into their nightgowns, wormed their way under the covers, and huddled close to each other for warmth. Henry could feel Robert’s body so close to him and hear his relaxed breaths, and something about that, itself, made his heart thud a bit harder. The warmth of their bodies quickly made Henry feel groggy. If he was to fall asleep soon, that would make for two nights of restful sleep in a row - a trend he hoped would continue for a long time. He closed his eyes and began to feel sleep wash over him.

Henry fell asleep that night, never noticing that Edward Hyde was simply nowhere to be found.


	6. Chapter 6

Everything was black.

Robert could see nothing but the stars above him in the inky darkness. Those dim spots were obstructed partially by what he could only assume were the tops of buildings as well as some clothing lines draping from them.

Robert turned, his eyes widening in an attempt to adjust to the light. Only being able to faintly see the brick walls on either side of him, Robert determined that he was in an alleyway. Unlike the one he’d been in before, this one was shockingly narrow. Only about two men could fit, shoulder to shoulder, and walk down it with relative ease.

Off in the distance, a shout, followed by struggling, sounded out. It echoed into the crisp winter air, the atmosphere of which forced a chill up Robert’s spine. It took a minute for him to get out of that shock. He checked to see if his revolver still rested on his hip, and sure enough, it did.

Robert could see better now, and decided to pick a direction and start walking. As he did, the sound of violent struggling increased until he could hear voices. One was frantic and begging where the other was gruff and unforgiving. Turning a corner, Robert found the two men he’d been hearing and watched as one dragged the other into an alleyway off of the one Robert had turned into. Just before they disappeared out of sight, Robert barely caught a glimpse of the kicking shoes of the man being dragged.

They were Henry’s shoes.

Robert’s heart stopped. He rushed for the corner the two had disappeared behind and found the other man throwing none other than Henry into a puddle of partially melted snow inside a dead end clearing in the alleyway. Henry coughed as the figure towered over him.

In an instant, Robert whipped out his pistol and leveled it at the man threatening Henry. He fired, but found the bullet ricocheting off of the air itself. Robert froze for a moment, but quickly shook himself off and tried to move in. To his surprise and utter dread, there was something in his way. He couldn’t see anything, but he felt a barrier before him, locking him out of the dead end. The two didn’t even seem to hear the gunshot.

“Please… I-I-I don’t know what you want, but whatever it is, I’ll give it to you! Please don’t hurt me! Please!” Henry begged. The man looming over him responded to his pleas with a swift kick to Henry’s abdomen, knocking the wind completely out of him. Robert’s stomach lurched.

“It’s not about what I want,” the towering figure stated. “It’s about what needs to happen.”

As Henry choked on his own gasps for breath, the man turned to the wall to his right and picked a pipe jutting out from below him. With a bit of effort, the man wrenched the pipe from its brethren and positioned himself back over Henry, now pinning his right hand down with his left boot.

Henry coughed for a while and tried to free his hand from the man’s boot, but to no avail. He managed to grab the man’s ankle and look up at him, his body curled as much as it could go. He trembled once he saw the pipe in the man’s hand and used his free arm to cover his head.

“Please- please,” Henry begged, his voice quivering, “I’ll give you anything you want - I-I’ll give you all I have, just please! Please don’t hurt me!”

“Pathetic,” the man spat. “Even _you_ know this needs to happen and you’re fighting it anyway. You, Henry Jekyll, are a coward.” The figure lifted his pipe to the now silenced man beneath him and brought it down swiftly onto his ribcage. A crack sounded out and Henry screamed in agony. He pushed and clawed at the ankle in his grip, but nothing seemed to phase the man.

Robert violently pounded and scratched at the barrier between them, desperate to break through. He wanted to yell at the man desperately, draw his attention away just for a second, but words wouldn’t form in his mouth. He pulled around the edges near the bricks, kicked wherever he could beneath him, and rammed into it as hard as he could. Ultimately, his efforts proved fruitless, and the man continued, neither of them capable of knowing that Robert was there at all.

The man turned to other spots on Henry’s body to mangle - his knees, his hips, his shoulders - but never once did he aim for Henry’s head. In fact, aside from the one blow to the ribs, the man completely avoided anything vital in Henry’s body and only aimed for what would hurt and disable him.

Robert pulled out his pistol again and fired at the man, but the results were no different than before, and the bullet landed in the wall behind him.

Henry’s shrieking eventually became too much to bear, and Robert collapsed onto his knees. He brought the side of his fist to the barrier weakly. He felt sick witnessing the event. The man clearly strived to inflict as much pain on Henry as he possibly could before death, and nothing could stand in his way.

After a solid minute of beating, the man removed his shoe from Henry’s wrist and stood over him silently, admiring his work. Henry could only stare wide-eyed into space while his breathing came out scratched and raw. His body laid crippled and immobile, some limbs bending where they never should.

“Now then,” the man prompted softly, “how was that?” Henry proceeded to hack extraordinarily painful coughs that sprayed blood on the ground, moving the arm that had been pinned down just an inch toward his head in a pathetically small exertion of energy. “Good,” the man replied. “I think my job is done here, then. I’ll be off, now.”

And then, the man was gone.

There was no obstruction of smoke, no flash of lightning - nothing to imply that he left. One second the man was there, and the next, he simply wasn’t. That was the last thing on Robert’s mind, however. The barrier between him and the rest of the alleyway had disappeared with the man, and Robert wasted no time stumbling hurriedly in to kneel at Henry’s side.

“Henry! Henry, can you hear me?” Robert rushed out.

“...Robert?” Henry’s voice cracked as he spoke back to him.

“Oh, Henry! I…” Robert frantically searched for words, but the only ones that could form were, “I’m here, Henry, I’m here.”

“...You… You shouldn’t be,” Henry stated in a matter of fact and confused tone.

Robert paused. “...What?”

“You should be at home right now, or at the Society doing paperwork. You shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t be anywhere near here.”

“...What are you talking about?”

“That man was right, you know,” said Henry, his voice low. Robert could only stare in silence until Henry continued. “This is what needs to happen. My bones need to be broken. My blood needs to be spilled.”

“Henry… I don’t get it. You’re speaking nonsense. ...B-But we’re going to get you back home, okay? You’re going to be alright. You’re going to get better, I promise.”

“You don’t understand,” Henry softly asserted, every breath a struggle. “Surely you, of all people would know how much of a liability I am. This needed to happen. It still does. It’s better I die here than continue to hurt everyone else. They all deserve better. Please step back and go home. I ought to die alone.”

Robert was dead silent, his mouth parted slightly in shock.

“I only fought him because I was scared. I know. I’m dying how I lived: as a coward. But there’s nothing for you to fear. Please… go home.”

“Henry! Do you not- what… wh-why are you- just-” Robert stuttered. “Just stop it! Stop it, please! Everything you’re saying is completely false! Stop talking like that!”

Henry was silent.

“Why don’t you understand?” Robert continued. “There is so much about you that… I just… I just need in my life.” Robert looked up at the wall to his right to clear his mind and desperately drum up examples. “The way you talk about things you love, how you smile when you find something new, the way your voice gets peppy when you find a new lodger to add to the Society, how free you sound when you’re drunk with me. Dear God, I could go on for days!”

Henry remained silent, but motioned for Robert to place his hand in his palm. Robert grasped Henry’s hand with both of his own and held it up to his mouth, bowing his head, tears burning his eyes. He couldn’t bear to look at Henry’s crushed body anymore, so he shut his eyes tightly. “Please, Henry. I want you to trust me.”

Robert spent the following few minutes spilling all the words he kept dammed up in his head for so long. All the compliments he felt too awkward to say, all the times he wished he could tell him how proud he was of how far he had come, all the words in his vocabulary he could muster to describe the pure joy and bliss he felt with Henry those distant summer nights at university. The words tumbled out of his mouth with haste and without regret. It was only after Robert needed to take a breath to think that he noticed how cold the fingers between his hands were. Freezing immediately, Robert dreaded the still sight that would appear before him once he opened his eyes. He finally looked down at Henry and his blood ran cold.

How long had he been talking to a corpse?

Robert’s heart became as heavy and as sickening as lead. His shaking hands moved to softly touch Henry’s cold face, but he retracted within seconds of contact. The person who he had become the closest with, the only person Robert had ever let inside his closed off heart and soul, was reduced to a frigid corpse upon the dirty cobblestone of this dark London alleyway.

Tears finally boiled over the surface of Robert’s eyes and fell onto his hands as well as the ones he used to call Henry’s. His closest friend had died before him believing fallacies of self blame as well as penitent justice in the actions of his assailant, and there was no way of knowing just how much Henry had heard of Robert correcting these false thoughts before he died. Robert began to weep wordlessly.

Robert then heard growling.

He shot up and stumbled backward toward the mouth of the dead end in terror. A large stray dog had crept up from behind him and had snuck its way around Robert toward the corpse. Its ratty and tattered pelt reeked of garbage and rotting meat. The stench alone was enough to make Robert recede further.

The glowing white eyes of the beast never broke eye contact with him as it slunk closer to Henry’s dead body. At the same time, a pair of rats scurried out from beneath some trash and sniffed the blood that had begun coagulating on the stone under their feet.

Robert froze solid as the vermin and stray began to feast upon the body, tearing chunks of flesh off the bones of his dearest Henry.

Robert turned, leaned against the wall, and vomited. He couldn’t take this anymore, and began to run. As he ran, every other corner he turned around, he found himself back at Henry’s corpse. He took lefts and rights and ran for minutes at a time, but to no avail. No matter what he tried, he couldn’t escape the horrific scene.

Something was wrong.

Taking another look at Henry’s body, he saw frost forming on bits of his skin.

Something was wrong.

Henry’s body began freezing to the ground as the scavengers broke chunks and chips off the rest of his corpse.

Something was wrong.

Robert felt ice creep up his shoes and secure his feet to the ground. He pulled and scratched at his restraints, but the ice had already made its way up to his knees. In the back of Robert’s panicked and muddled mind, something clicked, and he knew…

None of this was real.

~~~~~~~~~~

Robert’s eyes opened to find dim moonlight shining through the window. He looked to where Henry slept next to him and found him lying still and breathing softly. He couldn’t stop himself from leaning over Henry’s shoulder and gingerly brushing a lock of hair from his face. He stirred in his sleep and Robert retracted his hand, careful not to wake him.

Only then did he notice just how much cold sweat he was sleeping in.

It was all simply a nightmare. Henry was safe and sound right next to him sleeping snugly under a warm and thick wool blanket behind a locked door on the second floor of the building. He was safe - about as safe as he possibly could be. Nothing could happen to him right now. He was alive and breathing and for the time being, he was peaceful.

Slowly, Robert pulled himself to the foot of the bed and climbed out. He moved slowly to stand in front of Henry. His face looked so calm in the dim moonlight. Robert wanted nothing more than to kiss him lightly on the nose, but he stopped himself, knowing that it might wake his dear Henry, and that sleep was more important for him right now.

There was no way Robert was getting back to sleep after such a fright. The only way he could imagine not dwelling on the horrific imagery that poisoned his mental clarity was to busy himself with other things. So he turned around and did just that.

Hopefully he would make some progress before Henry woke up.

~~~~~~~~~~

Henry woke to the sound of gentle sweeping. The soft noise came from the kitchen, and only then did he notice that Robert wasn’t next to him.

“Robert?” Henry groggily called. “Is that you?”

Peering out from the kitchen doorway, Robert stated with a calm smirk, “The one and only.” Henry sat up in bed and felt blood rush from his head while Robert went back to sweeping. His vision nearly went black for a moment. After it cleared, he noticed a glass of water on the nightstand near his bed. Robert must have put it there for when Henry woke up. Knowing he needed it, he took it gratefully and downed the glass within seconds.

Only when he finished did Henry notice the change in scenery. His bedroom was quite pristine, with most messes completely taken care of. The only one that wasn’t was a pile of dirty clothes that looked to be a collection of the pieces previously strewn about the floor that had been raked into one place.

“Sorry I couldn’t get you breakfast,” Robert called from the kitchen, “but you know why. I can’t cook for shit, and it’s best when it’s still hot off the pan from Rachel, anyway.”

“You did all of this while I was asleep?” Henry asked in slight awe.

“Yes. I knew you were a heavy sleeper, but I was quiet anyway. I’m glad I was, too. You've been sleeping for quite some time, and that’s something you really need right now.”

“You’ve done an incredible job! I didn’t think you were ever taught how to clean, with your upbringing and all,” Henry mused. He then caught himself. “Oh… I’m… I’m sorry, that- that was rude of me.”

“No, no, you’re right! I wasn’t,” Robert quickly informed him, “I just got bored very often and spent a lot of time with the maids and butlers. I picked up some of what they did and eventually began parroting some of it myself. They told seven-year-old me that I helped them greatly, but if I’m being honest, I’m sure they were lying. I think they just appreciated the company.” Henry smiled at this imagery. Robert must have been absolutely adorable as a kid, prancing around with a little bow tie, pushing dust back and forth with a broom far too big for him. Just the thought of it made him smile. “It was only once I grew a bit and learned more that I actually provided assistance for them. There was one maid that actually taught me how to help best. She taught me a lot of things… Really, she was the only one who taught me anything beyond how to sit up straight, be quiet, and look sparkly.”

“Huh…” Henry exhaled, lost in thought. “Does she still work at your parents’ estate?”

“No, she’s been retired for about ten years or so,” Robert answered. “The last time I visited her, she was doing quite well. Her grandkids live in her neighborhood and she has a couple of cats that love to snuggle with her while she knits. Picturesque, isn’t it? I couldn’t imagine a better place for her to be than that. I’m glad she’s happy.”

“Oh, that’s just lovely!” said Henry.

“Yes, the whole situation was rather cute looking back at it.” Henry could hear the smile in Robert’s voice as he spoke. “Oh, I haven’t finished cleaning the kitchen, by the way. Don’t even attempt making breakfast in here. Let’s just go see Rachel. We should get out of this room anyway. We’ve spent too much time cooped up in here.”

Henry found his spirits greatly lifted from their conversation. It had been a while since his mood had been so normal. Just realizing this made his mood sway a bit, as if he had spoken too soon.

“How long have you been up?”

“A few hours.”

“Ah… What happened?

“Oh, just a bad dream was all. Nothing to worry about.”

“Oh. Do you want to talk about it?”

“No, no, I’m fine, really,” Robert assured, poking his head out of the kitchen. “I just had to busy myself, and soon enough, I shook it off.” Henry could hear Robert prop the broom up against the wall and walk out of the kitchen. He then stood leaning against the doorframe with a relaxed posture, crossing his arms. “How did you sleep?”

“Oh, just fine. I haven’t slept like that in quite some time.”

“That’s good,” Robert said, smiling.

Out of nowhere, it finally hit Henry like a falling tree that Robert had used his valuable time to clean up his messes. He began to feel a strong stinging guilt coil around his stomach.

“You don’t have to finish cleaning the kitchen after all you’ve done. I’ll take care of that part, don’t worry about it.”

“No, no, please Henry. Cleaning is actually the one chore I enjoy doing. Sure, it’s a drag in the beginning, but it becomes quite calming after a while. I get this feeling of great satisfaction when it’s done, too.”

“Oh…” Henry paused to think as Robert walked toward him. “Well okay, but only if you enjoy doing it. I’ll do any cleaning you don’t want to.”

Robert plopped himself down on the bed to the left of Henry and scooted closer, draping his arm around his shoulder. Henry couldn’t help but feel warmth in his face at the touch.

“...So last night,” Henry softly prompted. “...Are you okay?”

There was a moment of silence before Robert responded. “Yes… Yes, I’m fine. How are you?”

“I’m alright. It’s you I’m worried about.”

Robert began rubbing Henry’s arm gently up and down as he whispered, “Oh, I’m fine, really.”

“I didn’t mean any of the stuff I said about you, either. I don’t hate you.” Henry cleared his throat to keep his voice steady. “I really don’t hate you - I didn’t mean it.”

“I know you didn’t. Don’t you worry about that.”

Robert then slipped his fingers under Henry’s left hand and began to run his thumb lightly over the top of it.

They stayed like that for a while in silence.

Being touched by anyone was certainly something Henry was not used to. He had never really been used to such things. It had always flustered him quite a bit. With Robert, it wasn’t really different, but it was the only touch that was welcome to him. Every movement of Robert’s fingers brought a little more warmth to his face, and when he remembered what had happened just before sleep the previous night, he felt his chest flutter intensely.

Did Robert really feel that way about him?

He mentally shook himself off and shifted in place, prompting Robert to release Henry’s hand and shoulders.

“It’s okay if… you didn’t mean any of the stuff you said last night,” Henry muttered quietly. “Emotions were high and… if you said anything you would want to retract, you can do it at any time, and that’s perfectly fine. Just tell me to, and I’ll forget it ever happened, okay?”

“But I don’t want you to forget,” Robert asserted. “I meant every word that I said.” This made Henry’s face flare up again. He didn’t know how to respond. “Do you trust me?”

Henry nodded. “...Yes...”

“Good,” said Robert, smiling.

He then wrapped his arms around Henry, who slowly returned his embrace, smiling warmly.

In the back of Henry’s mind, something began to stir. He picked his head up and began looking around the room.

“What’s wrong?” Robert asked.

“I don’t know,” answered Henry, not breaking eye contact with the corner of the room. It was dark there, more so than what would be considered normal for a corner. “Edward?” he asked into the darkness. There was no response.

“Do you see him?” Robert asked.

“No…” Henry answered, “...but... maybe you’re right that we’ve been spending too much time cooped up in this room. Let’s go down for breakfast, shall we…?”


End file.
